Stirring the pot
by Tarrus
Summary: Harry has had enough, unable to die and sick of the world he decides to take a long rest. When he wakes, things are quite different. Starts pre-clone wars. Rated M, violence, possible adult situations. Definitely a slow WIP.
1. Chapter 1

SW/HP crossover-Stirring the pot

Harry was well aware that he was old, he had outlived Ginny and his children and his grandchildren, and so forth until he had given up trying to keep track. Despite his years, Harry the 'beacon of light' Potter did not age. His body had seemingly frozen in his mid twenties, he couldn't even get his facial hair to grow beyond a neat moustache and short beard. He had a few theories, most revolving around the cumulative affects of basilisk venom, phoenix tears and subsequent exposure to a time turner, horcrux's and his mothers lingering protection against the killing curse. Throw in some serious dementor exposure, his own not insubstantial power and being the subject of prophecy for good measure. In short, his life had been a veritable hodge podge of rarely encountered powerful magics, most of which he really should not have had any business surviving in the first place, something or everything in there would certainly be the cause. It did mean however that the first 150 years after he'd discovered his unique condition bad been spent fending off every power hungry idiot that decided he'd have a go at the old dark lord routine. One of Harry's least fond memories of this time was when he'd literally pulled his body back together after it had been squished and splattered into a soup of blood and pulp from several hundred bludgers across a quidditch pitch. It had ruined his appreciation of quidditch ever since. Eventually the idiots got the idea, Harry Potter cannot die, there is no point in trying, it did mean that governments requested his presence for years at a time as a deterrent and sometimes an unwilling specimen.

After reaching 350 years old he decided to withdraw from the world, he had grown tired of seeing the world change and being harassed, magic eventually became psionics. The muggles after publicly 'detecting' magic in the early 2500's had labelled it as psionics. In the following 50 or so years they had all but subsumed the magical world. Psionic potentials or magicals as Harry still thought of them had become a highly prized and contensiously accepted part of the world. The direct result of this was wizards and witches going wandless due to lack of materials as most magical species vanished. Those unable to escape exposure had long since been hunted to extinction for the materials their bodies provided, or under the name of scientific study. To compensate for this the development of the mental arts and basic elementalism which soon became the staples and limits of 'Psionic' power progressed as magical creatures got scarcer. Harry had also gone wandless, but more due to time granting experience, a slow cultivation of his own power and a familiarity with how to wield his magic as opposed to any degeneration in power, knowledge or available materials. The disappearance of those magical creatures with sentience from the world was really the wholesale migration of entire species into ever isolationist conclaves, not that Harry could blame them after the muggles led by a self proclaimed (Harry thought it idiotic to claim such a lineage after several generations) descendant of Bill and Fleur Weasley by the name of Otarin Desleran had kidnapped a goblin and presented it to the international press in the late 2580's.

Needless to say the next decade had been bloody, the goblins had not taken it well and had in retaliation publicaly executed the journalist who had interviewed Otarin in his own news studio, broadcast live. The last Harry had heard was that the goblins had gone to ground, launching subterranean assaults across the globe using several goblin magic infused part dragon part machine monstrosities that had earned the name threshers from the human governments for what they did to people on the wrong end. The worlds human governments enacted a search, capture and destroy policy, the capture part was a thinly concealed excuse to use those captured as materials in an attempt to amplify the powers of psionics. The goblins, not to be outdone had commandeered several state of the art research facilities into energy and weaponry, as well as deploying what the humans called the harvest protocol. That is the goblins would actively strip land bare of all resources surrounding any human farm or industrial land. It was only escalating. Harry was sick of it, he would not at all be surprised if in the next few years either side employed last resort weapons.

Personally Harry was a wanted man, magicals or Psionics had been issued a standing order from every government around the world, bring Harry Potter in. Harry was under no illusions as to what they would probably do to him if they found him. His last outing 3 years ago had ended in a confrontation with a scientist and two magicals that had tried to dissect him in the middle of a village square located in what used to be south east Russia, and was now a part of the Asia Conglomerate. He'd taken a rather painful injuries from the high powered railgun they'd used to introduce themselves. Needless to say, he did not go quietly and the blood stains he'd left behind had been the only trace of his presence for the follow up team to find.

So one sick of the world Harry Potter who could not die, or at least stay dead decided to sleep and hopefully let the world forget him. He had everything ready, 50 years of active magic coupled with probably the last vial of the draught of living death on the planet should ensure a long time comatose. The metal cube he would inhabit had been etched from floor to ceiling with some rather special runes that would ensure nothing should penetrate or disturb what was inside. No one would be able to get in, firstly because no one was in on the secret courtesy of a fidelius performed over 150 years ago and he was located in a highly undesirable location, 2 miles under the earth dangerously close to a volcanic vent, that without magic would have caused him to roast in under 10 minutes. He knew this because he'd gotten drunk and wanted to find out if it would off him. Painful way to go until his nerves shorted out, he'd apparated or as the Psionics claimed teleported out, (something now impossible without technology) once he realised after the 3rd time his nerves had regrown then been promptly burnt out that he wasn't going to die.

So mind set, he began the process of gathering the magic he'd consciously been expending into his little sleeping chamber and feeding it into the dragon blood treated rune array that he'd etched using the last of his basilisk venom store. He stood in the centre of the array with the potion. "Bottoms up" were the last words Harry Potter would speak for a very, very long time.

Time Skip-A long way from home/Awakening

Undisclosed location

Darth Plagueis was obsessive over his studies of the living force, he was aware of this, he simply did not care that it distracted him from his apparent greater goal of conquest. His apprentice Darth Sidious simply did not understand that the force was everything and everything was therefore the force. Life and death, simply a continuum that he would understand, one day he would understand, then he would master it. He could already reverse death, after a fashion. He could pull the departed from the fabric of the force so long as they themselves had been powerful enough in life to leave themselves embedded in the force on their passing. It was pleasing, that most of those he had pulled and changed had been jedi, changing them in-particular into the mindless husks that shambled and raged at everything was indeed satisfying. Yet he couldn't yet return full life, yet. His researches had already enabled him to outlive 3 apprentices, once he had brought himself back from a lightsaber to the back, since he had been more careful and disposed of the others as soon as the discontent got out of hand. It wouldn't do to kill them too early, they had provided invaluable insight into the contrast of light vs dark side force usage not to mention they made acquiring samples so much easier. In this regard Sidious was turning out rather well, Wookies it seemed had caught his newest apprentices eye. All specimens were useful and a Wookie was resilent enough to be usable much longer than most other specimen types. Plagueis would allow Sidious his political games so long as he continued to serve, after all the ambition to rule the galaxy and annihilate the jedi was nothing compared to mastering both life and death.

Sidious or as known to the galaxy the galactic republic senator of Naboo Sheev Palpatine regarded his masters preoccupied form, he had been stealing his research for near 2 decades and it continued to impress him, both at the information within and his masters apparent power to be able to use it. He was jealous of that power, he hated his master for the difference between them, he had seen the results of his masters labours. The disappointing husks as his master called them had nearly killed him the first time he had engaged one. Pathetic his master had called him, unable to prevail against such a simple foe. To add to the insult, Plagueis had simply snapped his fingers and blasted the husk apart, Sidious had been blown into the wall and knocked out. He would not suffer this for much longer, his labours in the greater galaxy were paying off, and his mastery over the force was developing, soon he wouldn't need Plagueis, only his research, especially his notes on prolonging ones own lifespan. Besides, not everything that he found related to the mysteries of the force was sent to his master. Sometimes, Sidious thought, fighting the urge to reach for his lightsaber, his master forgot what it meant to be Sith.

Kashyyk

Sidious allowed himself to feel excited, he had been searching the surface of Kashyyk for the structure beneath him for nearly a decade. He had come across its trace quite by accident. He had noted that the wookies that lived far above, in the three villages in close proximity to this location had turned out over the generations a considerably greater number of force sensitive children than anywhere else on record. The jedi had searched the area, but found nothing. Even his master had given the site a cursory look through the records stolen from the jedi. He had not found anything either, or at least nothing to warrant a personal visit, but Sidious knew there was something here. It whispered to him, a faint sensation of presence, almost like the veil Sidious used to keep himself from being discovered, but maintained for so long in one spot that it had started to ever so slightly alter the world. Indeed if it wasn't for his own veil he doubted he would have noticed, fortunate for him that Plagueis did not bother to venture out of his labs. Scanners revealed nothing, just dirt, small lifeforms and further down bedrock. But Sidious wasn't looking just with his eyes, he could feel it, directly below him, that presence, it was like the faintest breeze, one that had even shaped the area around it. By Kashyyk standards the small 200 by 150 metre patch of bare ground was unusual. Sidious activated the drill droids he had shipped with him, they would dig until they hit something, then Sidious would have his answers and force willing an advantage.

Harry drifted, drifted for so long, restful and peaceful. No kings Cross, no Dumbledore to talk to, nothing. This was not death, just pure rest. He was not cold, he was not warm he felt nothing and wanted nothing. He knew through the connection in his mind that the magic was going strong and therefore the potion was working. He drifted, awareness of his own mind the only companion. Harry had expected to eventually succumb to his own loneliness, yet he only registered the word numb to describe his state of being. Twice he thought he felt something, one perhaps something in proximity to the wards, then gone. The other something probing and questing, looking in broad sweeps. Reflexively he tightened the obscuring wards, he was not ready to face the world, just a little longer. The third time came, similar to the second, a probing, questing presence, but more insistent, focused with a greater weight of will behind it. Harry did not know how he had been found, but the presence kept returning, the mental sensations of the will behind it the only sign he could identify of its presence. He kept the wards tight, did not allow anything to penetrate as he nudged it along away from himself. The fidelius was holding but not entirely, whatever the presence coming from above him was doing was sufficiently different that the fidelius was not 100% at keeping others from finding him. Interesting Harry thought, perhaps he should surface, the presence above was insistent, surprisingly strong in terms of will and whatever it was doing it registered closely but still different to Harry's experience of magic and even its altered Psionic forms. Exercising his control over the flow of his magic, Harry carefully and slowly cancelled the shielding he was providing to the remnants of the draught of living death in his system from the cocktail that was his blood. It would take perhaps half a day but he would be waking up soon, Harry was looking forward to experiencing physical stimuli again.

A response! Sidious had gotten a tangible response from whatever it was in the earth beneath him. An awareness had shifted and wrapped his force sense in a breathtaking amount of power. Then it had swept his force sense into a chaotic milieu of the life signatures all around him. After regaining his focus, he ordered the droids to drill faster, and then probed again. The response this time was nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not even the wisps he had been chasing at the start. Frustrated Sidious focused deeply on the force then plunged his senses downwards, he would would not be intimidated. After a good 10 minutes of searching he found the trace, he redoubled his efforts and wrapped his power around it and followed it to its source. He was elated when his senses found purchase. There it was, a box that practically shone in the force, far too large to be a holocron. It was buried deep, Sidious estimated maybe 20 minutes for the droids to reach it. Sidious froze, in his excitement he had committed the greatest error he could possibly make. He had dropped his veil, there where always jedi on Kashyyk, they would come looking. Worse still, his master could have felt it, the only way to ensure his own survival would be to dispose of his master, the only thing in his favour would be if Plagueis was too engrossed in his experiments to register Sidious's mistake.

Physical feeling came slowly, to Harry, it started with itching as he registered the need to breath. Breathing was difficult to start, he had not done it for who knows how long. His lungs burned as his body started coming out of its induced stasis. Pain was next, and it slowly grew, his heart started beating, pushing blood. Everything throbbed to his increasingly fast heartbeat. Light assaulted him next, the glow from the runes was blinding even though Harry could remember the soft glow they gave off when he first activated them. Harry groaned and he instantly regretted it, his throat protested the flow of air. He was thirsty, he was hungry and he hurt, he was awake, and he was aware.

Harry needed water and food. He used his magic to solve the immediate problem, he dulled his senses with a charm that would fade over 10 minutes, conjured a cup and then filled it with conjured soup before drinking deeply. Temporarily satisfied Harry knew he would need to find real food and water or he would very quickly start to dehydrate. Banging and a strange sizzling noise came to Harry's hearing. Reaching out with his magic, Harry registered 3 presences, the one closest to him seemed to be trying to deliberately obscure his presence. This person or being felt remarkably similar to the more aggressive Psionics that Harry had come across, powerful but all about controlled aggression. The other two, much dimmer presences felt calmer, more passive in nature but currently they seemed to be in a state of flux, emotions of determination, anger and disbelief permeated their presences. Something wasn't quite right, the two calmer presences seemed to be jumping around like acrobats whilst the aggressive presence was doing something to the outside of his (creatively named) sleep room. Concentrating Harry pushed the wards beyond the boundaries of his rooms walls and was amused at the shock emanating from all 3 of the people outside as they where thrown away. Harry wanting to see outside of the room patted his robes down, then apparated to the new ward boundary away from the presences.

Emergence

The droids were too slow, he should have brought more, the jedi were closing in, he could feel them rapidly approaching. The droids had exposed the top of the large box, and were clearing away the earth around its sides. Whatever was inside, it was aware and it was rapidly growing in strength, the jedi undoubtedly could feel it. Letting his anger grow Sidious wrapped his veil around the box, he would not allow the jedi to profit from his efforts. He couldn't hide it, but he could at the very least make sure no one off planet below the most sensitive would sense it. Force damned jedi, always getting in the way at the least favourable moments. The sound of lightsabers being ignited drew his attention. The jedi were here and they were predictably demanding he surrender. Coiling his anger tightly and letting the force flow Sidious turned, and sent a blast of lightning at the interfering jedi. The younger, the padawan of the pair was blasted across the clearing whilst the older dodged then tried to rush him. Signalling the mining droids to attack Sidious ignited his own lightsaber and brought it down on the surface of the box. He would have its secrets, he would not be denied.

Kiffar Jedi knight Atrakan Meltheen had been momentarily thrown off balance by the surge of dark side force that had assaulted his senses. He had staggered in the middle of walking across a treetop walkway on his way to scout out possible force sensitives in the villages ahead. Fortunately he had the presence of mind to grab his human padawan, Sasheen before he keeled over the side. A Sith, one very close to his current position and one of obvious force strength. Abandoning his current mission Atrakan, still holding onto Sasheen bolted to the elevator that would take him to the forest surface. He had the presence of mind to activate his communicators emergency beacon with a simple message. "Sith on Kashyyk, I am engaging, send reinforcements". Atrakan briefly considered sending Sasheen away but against a Sith he would need at the very least a trustworthy witness. The elevator hit the ground and he used the force to accelerate his speed, due east he could sense a force presence. Not the Sith, nor a jedi, but something else entirely practically on top of where the Sith had been, indeed he could feel its force signature fluctuating, dimming against the rising dark side presence of the Sith, urging his padawan to greater speed they raced through the forest. He did not expect to find a dig site, mining droids littered the area. But what arrested his attention was the black cloaked figure, undoubtedly the Sith inspecting a large box like construct in the centre of the clearing. Igniting his lightsaber he was forced to jump out of the way as a wave of lightning spewed from the Siths fingers, Sasheen was not so lucky. Jumping from his crouched position Atrakan leapt for the Sith, hoping to buy his padawan time to recover.

The droids were poor combatants, their mining tools would normally crush a person with ease, that is a non force enhanced person without a lightsaber. Their industrial grade chassis parted beneath the blue lightsaber blade easily. Sidious briefly considered finishing the padawan but the knight was a more pressing concern. He could easily deal with the padawan but the knight would be something of a challenge, it didn't help matters his lightsaber was not even scratching the metal before him. Preparing himself for combat, Sidious was caught unawares when the awareness inside the box shifted. He had no time to brace himself as a wave of concussive force blasted from the box and flung everything and everyone into the tree line. Rolling to his feet Sidious immediately raced back to the box only to stagger back as an invisible wall stopped him in his tracks, it had felt like running into a block of ferrocrete. Summoning his lightsaber, he changed tack and charged the still recovering jedi knight. Red met blue with a hiss and sparks as they sought to overpower each other. Sidious was angry, his prize was currently compromised, he would need to leave soon before any message the jedi had sent reached Coruscant and his masters ears. Hate fuelling his strikes he drove the jedi away from the clearing into the trees. Only to have a green blade join the blue as the padawan rejoined his master. Growling, Sidious pushed both blades away and blasted at them both with lightning.

Atrakan was panicking despite his attempts to distance himself from the obvious surge of energy. He'd been blasted from the clearing in a wave of force. Now he was being pushed back by the onslaught of the Sith before him. He had no time to check on Sasheen, he could feel pain not his own through their bond but had no time to check. Swinging his blade in a broad horizontal arc, he forced the Sith to momentarily jump back. But before he could recentre himself the Sith was again on him. He could only hope to delay the Sith, the message was routed directly to Coruscant through Kashyyk's capital of Rwookrrorro. The Republic embassy there would contact the wookies and they would send immediate help. Straining against the Sith, Atrakan smiled as a green blade joined his, Sasheen was alright then. This momentary advantage was shattered as the Sith disengaged and blasted lightning from point blank range. Atrakan was consumed by pain as he was again thrown backwards. The last thing he saw was a sneering human face and a red blur before the world went dark.

Sidious let his hatred and fury propel him to the downed knight, and brought his blade straight down and through the Jedis head. Kicking the body away he turned and backhanded the padawn who had been blindly charging him from behind. Jedi, he thought, weaklings. Sidious advanced on the shaking padawan, red blade hammering down on him. Sidious did not need finesse here, the padawan was desperate and obviously sloppy in his attempts to defend himself. He pushed the padawan back, a right slash batted his block down, a left upwards stroke cleaved the handle of the lightsaber in half, the return swing took his arm at the elbow. Sidious smiled, dismantling a jedi, even a padawan was satisfying. The padawan was breathing heavily, clutching his cauterised arm in shock as he knelt in the dirt. Sidious brought his blade down and hit earth, the boy had flung himself backwards and away, stubborn child. Advancing slowly Sidious realised he'd re-entered the clearing and subsequently cornered the child. The invisible barrier that he himself had run into had cut of the padawans retreat. Raising his blade again, he brought the killing blow down. This time he did not miss. As the padawans body slumped and slid down the barrier, Sidious became aware that he was being watched, the awareness weighed on him. Facing the box Sidious was prepared for the pulse of power this time, he was not however prepared to see the box liquefy. Sidious watched warily as the liquid fountained. He was astounded when from out of the fountain stepped a young human male in strange clothes.

Meeting and disagreeing

Harry was now whole in himself, he could hear, taste, touch, smell and feel without being overwhelmed. He knew that outside of his room that one of the presences had died, the two others in combat with a clear advantage to Mr aggressive. He did not particularly mind, Harry had been around death for a long time. What did concern him was what was going to happen as soon as he emerged. He had no desire to be brought into the fight happening outside hence the extension of the ward line. It was admittedly amusing when he'd sent everyone flying, what he had not expected to feel was several other impacts, he hadn't registered anyone else and he was pretty confident in his skills at sensing. Well no time like the present, Harry activated the folding procedure for the room, no point in leaving it around for just anyone to find. Just as the walls started to liquefy Harry registered the death of another person, this time directly on his wards. Well, Harry hoped Mr aggressive had a good reason or Harry's current non-involvement policy might just go out the window. Killing someone effectively on top of another persons doorstop was not a good way to go about a civilised exchange. Natural light assaulted Harry's eyes as he stepped through the fluid surrounding him. Trees, giant trees, Harry was standing in a forest clearing with the largest trees he had ever seen surrounding him, they very nearly blotted out the sun, they were the size of skyscrapers and looked to be nearly as wide. Refocusing on his immediate surroundings Harry looked over who he could only assume was Mr aggressive. Black outfit with shadowy hood, check, standing over a body of someone in a much more neutral colour scheme that looked like a child, holding a presumably weapon of red light and practically oozing a sense of anger mixed with hatred. Harry sighed, figures that first contact would be with what was evidently not a poster child for all things warm and fuzzy. Well he had wanted different, at least his surroundings supported that idea. Now to try and find out what was going on, then he'd see about vivisecting the child killer.

Sidious did not know how to proceed, he had half expected to find a sarcophagus of some ancient Sith lord, or perhaps a force imbued repository, not a living person. Disconcertingly he could no longer feel anything with his force senses relating to what was just before him. The box was gone, the barrier was still there even though he couldn't sense it, the body below him was resting against thin air otherwise. Before the power had been intoxicating, now it was absent, as if it hadn't existed to begin with. Tightening his grip on his lightsaber, Sidious took stock. He could not initiate conflict with this man, the barrier prevented it, not to mention the power he assumed belonged to this stranger. Well he wasn't a successful politician for nothing, diplomacy would be better here. Adopting a deferential posture Sidious deactivated his lightsaber and allowed senator Palpatine to take over. Gesturing at the body on the ground, Palpatine initiated dialogue. "Greetings, I apologise for any disturbance I may have caused with this, I am afraid I was forced to defend myself and hope you do not hold this against me."

Interesting, Harry thought. Mr aggressive had done an apparent 180 in personality, from the tone of the words he was being very polite whilst indicating a degree of trust by turning his light beam off. He didn't however understand what the man had said, not to mention the body at his feet. Well lets start with the basics then. Pointing at himself Harry replied with a "Harry", pointing at Mr aggressive he waited, then pointed back at himself and repeated "Harry." It took a few tries of this before the other man cottoned on. He replied with "Darth Sidious". Neither first or surname registered in Harry's memory, entirely new language, clothing type and technology if that light beam was anything to go by. Lets try to find some things out. Pointing to the body, Harry raised an eyebrow. Darth Sidious looked down and with what Harry thought was anger colouring his voice responded with a flat "jedi." Harry held his hand up and started summoning things from around him. He repeated this until he'd gotten to the head of a robot, robots when he had last seen them had been clunky things resembling giant arms or part of a human controlled apparatus. This seemed to be an autonomous humanoid robot, or 'droid' if the word Darth kept using was correct. Harry shifted his focus back to him as he started tapping on the ward line, he was getting impatient, and angry again. Remarkable self control really, the man had yet to make any moves against him, though the wards would have rendered that moot anyway. Extending his senses, Harry felt several presences approaching at speed, perhaps more jedi then? That would explain Darth's anxiety. Harry still didn't know what the beef between Darth and the jedi was. What he did know was that he should probably get a better grip of the world around him, its language before proceeding and see about bringing the man to someone who would care that he'd killed a kid.

Sidious was getting agitated, he could sense several beings rapidly closing in on his position and the stranger, 'Harry' apparently did not speak basic, and even seemed surprised at finding a droids head. He needed to take this 'Harry' away before he was found and forced to slaughter more people to maintain his cover. Reaching out he tapped the barrier, this got an immediate reaction from the man. Beckoning him over, Sidious was fighting the urge to simply start smashing at the barrier with his lightning. This 'Harry' had closed his eyes, and with a strange feeling of wind flowing around him his hand went through the barrier and the body of the padawan dropped completely to the ground. It was then that Sidious realised a problem, the beings approaching were between them and the only elevator back up for 20 clicks. Sidious transport was in a hidden hangar disguised within a power distribution centre. Gesturing with more energy and urgency Sidious tried to lead 'Harry' away, whilst lacing his veil across the both of them.

Personal Boundaries and teddy bears

Harry did not appreciate what Darth was doing, trying to smother his magical aura with his own was considered incredibly invasive and in some cases an attempt at subjugation. Harry flexed his own magic as a warning to the man, breaking the miasma that he was wrapping around him with ease. Harry Potter was not someone you tried to control. Darth recoiled at this and went for his light beam. Harry would have none of it, he had dropped the wards in good faith hoping Darth would go easily, now he would demonstrate just why he wasn't to be taken lightly. Cupping his hands Harry focused forming a small ball of yellow light between his palms. Thrusting his hands forward he let loose a concentrated incendio, the flames burst around Darth who jumped clear with astonishment clearly evident in his presence. Harry was surprised when in a burst of speed Darth closed the distance and sliced at him with his light beam. Harry reacted too slowly and staggered back in disbelief, looking at where his hand used to be. Harry had had enough, with a growl he threw a point blank blasting hex at the man and watched as after a moment of struggling against the momentum it was deflected to the side by the crimson light beam. Following up Harry cast a chain that comprised of a liberal amount of bombarda's, piercers and reductos. He was annoyed when Darth either deflected them or dodged out of the way, it did however make him back off. Darth returned with a wave of lightning which Harry promptly conjured an earthen wall to stop. Time to get creative, thought Harry. Slamming his hand to the ground it started to rumble, then large earthen hands rose out of the ground and his makeshift wall to grab at his opponent. Darth quickly used his light beam to cut the hands apart. Snapping his fingers Harry watched dispassionately as the hands exploded, sending Darth flying, the follow up overpowered peircer was caught on the mans light beam but he was struggling against the force of the spell. It partially succeeded, Harry had to give some grudging respect to the man, he had managed to deflect most of the piercer but had still wound up with a deep gash to the side of his abdomen.

Harry summoned his dismembered hand and held it to the appendage it had been severed from, with a small burst of concentrated magic his hand had reattached itself. It was then that Harry felt a shift in the man. He was channelling his energy to his wound and legs. Realising that the man was about to run, Harry made to stun him. Only to be stopped by a bright green bolt of energy zooming past his head. When the spots in his vision cleared, Darth had scarpered and there where several very tall, very muscular, what looked to be teddy bears with what Harry assumed to be guns levelled at him. Harry smiled at them and tried a tentative hello with a wave. The tallest of the group growl yelled something at him, Harry stood there unsure what to do. The giant gun toting teddy bears advanced slowly, Harry kept smiling, hoping to come across as friendly, well this was different.

Sidious was ready to kill something, anything, he had been so close but then the stranger 'Harry' had thrown everything to the bantha shit heap. He'd managed to get back to his ship after hijacking a speeder, and nearly had to crawl into the bacta tank his storage area housed. The fight between them would have tipped Plagueis off, there was no way he wouldn't have noticed power like 'Harry' was throwing around even in his labs. Sidious didn't doubt that even the Jedi would have felt it, Yoda and Windu sprang to mind instantly. Sidious needed to disappear, unfortunately Palpatine couldn't. He had one chance to stay alive, kill Plagueis and live as Palpatine. Sidious fervently hoped that 'Harry' had not seen beneath his hood, he always kept a shroud over the top half of his face, but the fact that he was still alive promised the possibility of being compromised, Palpatine was hardly a private figure after all. Sidious had a plan for Plagueis, he would tell his master about 'Harry', that trick with his hand would arouse Plagueis interest intensely. It would give him a small amount of time to implement one of his riskier plans for disposing of his master, if it didn't work, well he was dead anyway. Giving commands to the pilot droid the ship exited the hangar. It was the work of a minute to transmit the security codes he'd used to land in the first place to his ever so helpful piratical acquaintances, he could still salvage something from this. With a pained hiss, Sidious allowed the med droid to administer sedatives as he floated in the bacta tank, he would be seeing 'Harry' again and he would kill him, painfully.

Harry found himself liking the teddy's, he still didn't know what they where called. They had given him some food and what he presumed to be water as soon as they heard his stomach grumble. They had however cuffed his hands together and there was always a gun pointing at him, understandable really after what he'd just seen not to mention the bodies being carried by them. He was currently riding an elevator in the middle of a tree, and if that wasn't mind boggling enough he had noticed the tree was humming with power. A effective biological power plant that formed the basis for the teddy's homes. Reaching the top of the elevator his guard, nudged him forward, surprisingly gentle for such a large being but still not to argued with. What followed was a long walk to a large platform with hovering vehicles, some of them seemed o be partly made of wood. It was into one of these that he was ushered into, and with a humming whining noise they where flying. Harry had honestly missed flying, he promised himself he would learn how to fly one of these one day, nothing would keep out of the sky for long now that he was back in society away from any who could recognise him. Looking around he was stunned to see that the forest, stretched from Horizon to Horizon, nothing but trees as far as the eye could see. The flight took maybe an hour in Harry's estimation, the landscape was still trees but to his right he could also see a large body of water, a sea perhaps. Every time Harry moved his guards would shift, keeping their guns pointed at him. Leaning back Harry continued to look out the side of the vehicle, in the distance, a set of trees larger than those in the forest below jutted out of the canopy and around them he could make out several dozen specks that as he got closer turned into more flying vehicles. What caused Harry to grin with excitement was that some of the larger vehicles where going straight up.

Yoda came out of his meditations, he had sensed great power, its absence and then its return in sporadic bursts. All the while he could also sense a dark presence, undoubtedly Sith. Kashyyk it seemed had extremely momentous goings on. This was corroborated by the emergency transmission from Knight Attrakan Meltheen that came through not minutes later. Yoda gave orders to make his personal shuttle ready. Whatever it was, the source of the power, he could only hope that the Sith was stopped before it fell into their hands. The council would cope without him for awhile.

Questions, some answers and a little patience.

Rwookrrorro, strange name for a city, Harry thought after an embarrassing few minutes trying to get his guards to tell him where he was with lots of pointing. Well perhaps not strange considering how his hosts seemed to speak in growls, yells and grunts. He had been paired off with a droid, a spindly looking thing that every few seconds would say something that Harry had no idea as to what it meant. He had tried to introduce himself but the closest the droid had come to something he could understand sounded suspiciously like latrine. Harry had taken up the challenge and was trying to say hello in as many languages as he could remember, Japanese, German, French, Spanish, Greek even a half hearted aloha made it in to his attempts. His current entourage consisted of two of the teddy's or Wookies as they had pointed to themselves and growled out, and a human woman in a uniform that kept looking between him and the droid, probably for some sign of understanding. It was getting annoying for Harry, he'd even whistled at the droid and it had whistled straight back causing the woman to sit up straight with an eager expression, followed by a short dialogue and more whistling. The disappointment was easy to read as the woman slumped back down into her chair.

Well only one language left, wonder if snakes made it, Harry wondered. "Hello?" Harry tried. The Droid responded immediately. "Hello, I am C3 D9, interspecies speaking metal man. Tongue designated Wyrm." Harry was astonished and noticed the woman cautiously sitting up with interest and the Wookies also leaning in. "Wyrm speech? What do you mean, and why are you speaking like that?" Harry inquired. The droid responded with "Wyrm speech, instinctive tongue to many reptilian species, often known to native speakers as the one true tongue. Tongue is not conducive to adequate descriptions of myself or objects made by traditional non-speakers." "Ok, what is going on?" Harry asked snorting at the true tongue comment. The droid responded with, "You were found on forest surface, evidence of two dead... magic, users and signs of fighting with a third. You have been brought here to answer questions about what happened." The woman at this point was leaning over the table, and said something to the droid., the droid responded, the woman frowned then said something else. The droid turned back to Harry "Query, who are you?"

Jania Comarila, Republic police officer had been having another uneventful peaceful day on Kashyyk. That is until a jedi priority emergency transmission originating from a village 70 klicks south of the capitol had sent the office into dissaray. The communications tech had forwarded the message to Coruscant, and a security team had been dispatched. The Wookies that comprised the security team had left in a hurry. The office had then rapidly settled, she had then proceeded to prep an interrogation room, notified the medbay for possible casualties and put a protocol droid on standby, if any of the Wookies got hurt, it would be needed. She did not expect to be sitting for near to an hour watching the droid and a young human male failing to communicate. So far only a brief whistling match had garnered any sort of success. She could tell the Wookies beside her were amused rather than bored but she was getting frustrated, she needed to get somewhere, the office commander had told her that the legendary Jedi grand master Yoda was personally coming and the last thing she needed was to screw this up.

Squawks, slurping, growling even a few snorts had passed from the droid to the young looking male, who she had to give some credit had apparently persevered in his own attempts to communicate. The male had reclined in his own chair also looking frustrated not that she could blame him, what she wouldn't give for one of the adaptive first contact protocol droids. She was just about to accept that they were getting nowhere when the male started hissing at the droid and the droid hissed back!. Sitting up straight she watched the two exchange a short burst of hisses. Leaning across the table she asked the droid "What language is he speaking and what did he just say?" The droid responded with, "the subject is speaking fluent Wyrmspeech to a degree greater than this units own programmed knowledge. This is an instinctual language to numerous reptilian species with no recorded instances of use from biologicals outside of said species, subject has asked what is happening. I have informed him of why he is here" Jania frowned at this, at least she could communicate with him now, "ask him who he is."

It took perhaps 30 minutes by Harry's reckoning once they started talking. The droid kept pausing and starting its sentences, he got the feeling that the language itself was rather deficient in some areas. The woman in the uniform had been asking a lot of questions, particularly about the one he'd fought. She kept referring to the man he'd fought as Sith, and the other two as Jedi, apparently this was supposed to get a response from him. He'd tried to tell her he was a wizard, but couldn't be sure he'd gotten his point across very well if the 5 minute back and forth over that particular phrase was any indication. The demonstration of making his chair levitate had taken them back to the droid claiming he was a Jedi, well, once the Wookies lowered their weapons. So far he'd been treated alright, they'd even given him a drink that smelled and tasted a bit like coffee, he was however quite sure that the two Wookies would disagree if he tried to leave. Fortunately, he had been able to confirm several things, yes this was the planet Kashyyk, apparently space travel was very common and there was even a government that controlled most of the known systems called the republic, which Kashyyk belonged to. He got what sounded suspiciously like a laugh from one of the Wookies when the droid translated his query as to if he was being detained. The woman, officer Comarila had through the droid said they were waiting for someone who would decide just that, another Jedi called Yoda. It was at this point that what sounded like an air raid siren came on.

Big, green and highly flammable

The explosion took everyone by surprise, one moment they were doing the back and forth with the droid then whoomph, everyone's on the floor and people started yelling. The Wookies recovered quickly and Harry saw one pick up a stunned officer Comarila with one hand, Harry waved the other one off as it tried to pick him up too. Another explosion, this one closer rocked the room and the Wookies ushered him out. People, of all descriptions, Wookies, humans and several that Harry couldn't identify were scrambling around. A dozen armed Wookies came hurtling down the corridor in the direction of the entrance. It was then the third explosion hit.

Several died immediately, part of the ceiling and adjacent wall of the exit had disappeared in an inferno. It was the work of the moment for Harry to deflect the growing fireball but he was not fast enough to prevent casualties. Through the hole in the ceiling Harry could see just what was assaulting them. 3 ships, each maybe a kilometre long and several hundred metres wide was raining green and red light on the city. They were ugly, blocky looking things, covered in rows of thin spines and protrusions. Several smaller craft where coming from each and looked to be landing in the city. From the noises further into the city it seemed the Wookies had already mounted a defence, Harry unable to resist made towards it.

Yoda was in orbit, currently sitting on the bridge of a republic consular class cruiser watching the events unfolding below. Trandoshan slavers, their presence, not to mention their timing was highly suspicious, the vessel he was on would be unable to run interference due to its lack of armament and he would not risk a drop pod into the middle of an active fight. Yoda was therefore forced to watch as the Wookies were once again harried and all he could do was dispatch a message to republic security forces and hope for their swift arrival. If he could only get to ground safely he could assist directly. Turning to the pilots he told them to patch him through to the Wookies command centre, maybe they could get him to ground. Then maybe, he could get to the bottom o what was happening on Kashyyk.

Harry was levitating an unconscious Wookie child out of the debris that once was a vehicle and away from the body of what was presumably its parent, when he came under fire. Quickly generating a shield to stop the red beams of light from hitting, he was surprised to find that his assailants were yellow green reptilian looking things that moved in an odd bowlegged gait. They were also much larger than any of the humans he'd come across so far. They hollered at him and kept shooting, using one hand to hold a shield over the child, he used his other to send several cutting curses their way. He got two, one straight down the middle and another he clipped on the arm. They bled yellow, go figure. Far from deterring them the remainder shrieked at him and started charging, wielding crude looking blades. Harry managed to blow another to pieces with a bombarda and drop another with a piercer to the head. Then the remaining 3 were on him. Extending the shield onto his person Harry pumped more power into it to stop the physical attacks from landing. He petrified the one straight infront of him, but was slammed into the side of the building next to him by being tackled. The shield prevented any serious harm but it didn't stop him from being smacked around. The last two thinking he was out made towards the child. Harry's growl stopped them in their tracks, and the subsequent fire storm that engulfed them, reduced them to ash. Harry stared, apparently whatever these things where, they were highly flammable. Surprise turned to a wicked smile, Harry could do fire.

If Harry needed any more proof as to the flammability of the reptile men, he had accumulated plenty of supporting evidence. He'd taken to using bursts of fire to put down any of them he came across, all the while steadily making his way to where the sounds of battle where greatest. After seeing several of the invaders with crude pole-arms with nooses on the end dragging a struggling Wookie down a street, he wasn't feeling very charitable. His subsequent intervention had gained him said Wookie following him around, the benefit of this was the Wookie was directing him. 6 streets later he entered what looked to be a large square, crawling with Wookies and lizard people all shooting at each other. Harry's Wookie guide took off towards the closest group of Wookies and promptly joined in after being thrown a weapon. Time to get seriously invested Harry mused. He knew several wide range flame spells but seeing as there was no real cohesive battle lines, most of them would risk the Wookies. Fiendfyre would do very nicely, after nearly a century dedicated solely to developing his control, it would pose the least risk to the Wookies whilst making sure the lizards would not escape. Breathing deeply, then exhaling Harry centred himself and let his magic flow, "fiendyre" he breathed.

It started as a small tongue of yellow flame, it lazily drifted to the closest group of Trandoshans and near snakelike it wrapped around one. Then it squeezed the Trandoshan who screamed and flailed, soon there was a pillar of fire in place of a Trandoshan. The flames shot out in several tendrils this time, seeking new targets. Every Trandoshan that erupted into flame gave rise to more tendrils. The streams of flame twisted across each other, growing in size and taking on form. Birds, serpents, lions and demons came from the rapidly spreading inferno, engulfing Trandoshans and skirting the edges of the Wookies positions. The Trandoshans were screaming in fear, trying to run. The Wookies where lying prone behind whatever cover they could find. The flames roared and swirled, turning the few weapon emplacements into slag. The last Trandoshan died in a burst of flame. Then the fire coalesced into a towering giant, wings of flame spanned the entire courtyard, a long flickering tail swayed above the heads of the Wookies, attached to a large body and serpentine neck that was in turn attached to a head of flame that regarded the human who had conjured it in fury. With a hiss the head lunged, and then dispersed in a spray of sparks. The headless body of flame faltered, then began to dissolve away into nothing. Stunned silence was all that was left as the Wookies slowly stood and turned to look up at the sky, fearing the flame would return.

Yoda staggered and clutched tightly at his cane, the sporadic bursts of force power had turned into a blazing supernova across his senses. He'd never felt anything like it in such a contained controlled manner, the sheer anger and hate had left him feeling numb, but the will that tethered and controlled it was what he was worried about. He'd seen a towering creature made of flame crouching over the central plaza with his own eyes, not a vision but first hand from the ship as it descended. The powerful presence flexed and then vanished as soon as the creature disappeared. Whatever this thing was, Yoda hoped it would not be used against the Wookies. Yoda made himself ready to greet the Wookies, they had cleared a landing site and he would be reaching planetside in minutes.

Taking the fight to the enemy.

He'd scared the wookies, unsurprising really, you'd expect to be looked at fearfully after conjuring a giant creature of flame. They where cautious of him now, many were even keeping him in their weapon sights. The others were carefully moving around the battlesite in a search pattern, pulling wounded and dead from wherever they had fallen and out of the open plaza. He was uncertain what to make of the wookie whom he had saved attempting to get the others to lower their weapons, it would seem he'd won at least one friend. Turning his attention skyward, Harry contemplated what to do with the ships still up there. Fire worked wonders on the reptilian looking species but he had no idea what would even dent something like what was hovering above. He was forcibly snapped out of his musings as he was grabbed for the second time today by a very furry, very large and very very strong hand and pulled. Once he got his focus back Harry was in a very tight hug with his newest friend who was growling at the other wookies, or more notably the newly arrived contingent of wookies all in what could pass as heavy armour, with what looked suspiciously like a rather old and green house elf in their midst. It was then that the plaza erupted into more gunfire.

Harry managed to escape his friends crushing embrace with a somewhat sloppy and on reflection ill advised apparition, the resulting bang of his reappearance caused several of the wookies to start firing at him. Protecting himself with a hastily cast protego Harry took stock of the new situation. The wookies were shooting at him, probably startled at his apparition, he could deal with that once they calmed down. The lizards where back in force and packing what looked like some far more serious firepower if the assortment of barely flying vehicles where anything to go by, and already gunning down anyone out of cover. To top it off there was a green blur leaving behind neatly severed bits of lizard and reflecting any of the projectiles that made contact. Casting a calming charm on his new wookie friend who was trying to re-engulf him Harry made his decision. The lizards had three ships, each ship probably already contained captured wookies, freeing them should get the wookies to like him as a whole. Siding with the lizards was out, Harry simply couldn't stand anyone who had slaver written all over them. Laying his hand on his new friends arm Harry focused on the ship directly above, there was a transport just leaving it and he could make out several of the lizards on its top, an open air vehicle, perfect.

Sheeottuwl was having a surreal experience. First the trandoshans had attacked, not in of itself strange but being saved from one of their raiding parties by a strangely dressed human was. Resolving to help the human Sheeottuwl had led him to the plaza to try and get some assistance. He hadn't expected the plaza to be a battlezone but had not complained about the bowcaster he'd been given or the chance to show the trandoshans a bit of wookie hospitality. He'd just been given the weapon when the trandoshans had started to catch fire. The first few had died slowly and he'd had time to ask who was using incendiaries before the day got really weird. The fire had seemingly taken on a mind of its own and had started jumping to more and more of the lizards, culminating in a great creature of flame that had towered over the plaza, more than one wookie had tried to shoot it. The fact that the human he'd been escorting was the one to make it vanish had resulted in every wookie that had seen openly stare at him. What followed was a rather intense series of arguments in trying to get his fellows not to shoot the human. Now however he'd given up trying to keep track of what was happening, he was feeling calm, nothing much was wrong with anything, he had been shoved through an extremely unpleasant tube but that was okay. He was standing in the midst of several shocked trandoshans in the air on a transport but that was also okay. The human turned to him and gestured, his sense came back in force. The resulting roar shook the transport as he hurled himself at the lizards.

Harry was quite impressed with the violence before him, though lifting an active calming charm could cause unpredictable behaviour in high stress situations, this was still impressive. The lizards were fast disappearing under the Wookies onslaught. Harry winced as one was dropped minus most of its head as the Wookie began smacking another over the head with an arm liberated from a previous lizard. Even in his extensive life he'd never seen someone beaten to death with an appendage before. He'd have to clean the green splatter off of himself later. For now he had a ship still to board. Carefully casting a weak expulso he swept the corpses off the vessel. The Wookie seemed to pre-empt his intentions as it snatched the lizard operating the controls and hurled it over the side before promptly taking over. The transport slowly turned around and made its way back to were it had come from. Taking careful aim, Harry busied himself with torching the remaining transports he could see and keeping an eye on the vessel they were approaching. The growl from the Wookie was all the warning he got as the transport lurched, nearly sending him over the side. The large vessel above had started firing on them. Bolts of energy nearly the size of Harry himself were streaking through the air as some of the smaller turrets started tracking them. Thrusting his arm as if it held a spear, Harry let loose with a blasting hex. A green opaque light bloomed from above the turret he'd been aiming for and blocked the hex with a dong, before disappearing with a ripple. A few stopped hex's later and Harry realised the vessel had a shield, the damn thing had a shield. Switching to piercers, the shield flared and stayed visible for longer but still held, all the while the Wookie was swerving and tilting the vessel like mad to escape the return fire. Harry applied a sticking charm to his feet, erected a protego maxima and considered what to do. The Wookie was yelling at him, the vessel above was still shooting at them and more transports were being launched, the only good thing was they were making steady progress towards the launch point. The shield was obviously one way, penetrating it would take an unknown level of power. He'd simply have to get behind the shield and figure out how to overpower it later. Sighing, Harry really hoped that the energy field of the shield didn't stop apparition, otherwise this was going to hurt, a lot.

Trandoshans were falling across the plaza, not to fire this time but a green blur that left behind neatly bisected bodies in its wake. The blur was considering the day even as it negligently deflected the few blaster bolts that would have connected. Yoda was relieved, Republic security forces had arrived in system, now it was only a matter of time before the trandoshans were forced to either flee or face imprisonment. The Wookies, superb fighters though they were, were now, and always had been relatively easy pickings for coordinated slaver raids. This was not the first time, second or third time Yoda had intervened on behalf of the Wookies relating to slavers. Each of the times he had petitioned for the planet to establish a proper millitary presence but the Republic never agreed, and the Wookies themselves were far to prideful to accept. Dismissing the thoughts Yoda turned his attention skyward, the newcomer was up there. Still wielding the force in ways that confused his senses. He'd tried to prevent the Wookies from firing on the man when he pulled his little disappearing and reappearing trick, but had been forced to engage the returning trandoshan assault. The man had positively radiated with force power, but had also seemed to have something else interwoven with it, whatever it was the only words Yoda could use to describe it were old and primal. Trandoshan transports, warped beyond recognition were falling across the city, bodies of their unfortunate passengers in tow, the work of the newcomer no doubt. There would be a long discussion between them later but for now he had people to protect, Yoda focused on his body using the force to increase his speed even further as he continued to slice his way through trandoshans, he was closing on what appeared to be the field commander.

Happy landings

He was right, it hurt, a lot. He'd materialised on top of the vessel just above the hangar and had promptly collapsed heaving. The energy field had not been easy to get through, but unlike a ward he'd felt as if he'd been drowning in molasses rather than simply repulsed. After taking a moment to adjust and regain his feet, he looked for the transport he'd just vacated. There, franticly bobbing up and down in the air was the transport he'd just vacated trying to get closer to the hangar entry whilst dodging energy blasts. He was behind the shield, time to give his friend a little aid, lets see how strong the armour is. Spying the turret he'd been trying to disable before, he let loose with another blasting hex. This time the turret crumpled, before something inside it ignited, ejecting the turret from its housing with an explosion that sent a shudder through the metal under his feet. Smiling Harry went after the others in sight. By the time he'd cleared the immediate area the transport had made it through. Turning his attention downwards Harry let loose with a series of piercing curses, the first dented the metal, pumping more power into it the second caused some noticeable groaning from the metal. Throwing as much power as he could into the third, it went clean through the metal casing and straight down. Harry willed the disturbed metal to peel back, overcoming its resistance with a significant portion of his power it squealed as it parted. Harry jumped in, sending a blasting hex downwards for good measure.

Sheeottuwl was seriously regretting helping the human, it had done something to him that had messed up his head, taken him into the middle of the trandoshan forces without backup or a weapon and made it so that he was forced to land, alone, in one of their ships. He'd made into the hangar easyily enough when the turrets tracking him had detonated, no doubt courtesy of something the human had done. Landing the transport was proving more difficult however, the trandoshans were in the process of launching another transport, packed with the slavers as he'd entered. Disengaging the drive, directly above the leaving transport, Sheeottuwl amended his earlier thoughts. He still thought this was all the humans fault, but the sound of trandoshans screaming and then the splat as his transport landed ontop off the other was satisfying enough to delay any ideas of showing his displeasure. Abandoning the cockpit, Sheeottuwl leaped from the transport as soon as it and its unfortunate partner hit the floor. Now to find a weapon and hope he'd survive long enough for the human to do something nuts again. Running for the cover of several storage containers, Sheeottuwl had to leap out of the way as a thin beam of white light appeared in front of him. Making it to the cover, his sensitive ears made out the noises of metal being stressed to the breaking point, before the portion of ceiling not far from his position exploded in a boom, sending shards of metal spraying over the room and sending a ventilation shaft crashing to the ground. After everything that had happened lately, Sheeottuwl was honestly unsurprised to see the human literally float from the ceiling, strange clothes flaring around him. The trandoshans however were, and it was this that cost one of them his head, and his weapon. Sheeottuwl was ready, with any luck the human wasn't done with whatever force power he was throwing around. This thought turned to concern when the human summoned a weapon.

His friend was ok, good, and had acquired a weapon even better. Harry was starting to tire, the day's use of his magic was starting to wear on him, especially as he'd been using extremely powerful versions of spells since the attack on the city began. Fortunately, he was back to engaging the lizards directly, much easier than tearing a hole in a spaceships roof. Cancelling his arresto momentum, he allowed himself to drop the last foot to the ground. The wookie started shooting, catching two of the lizards unawares, prompting the start of a firefight. Summoning a duplicate of the weapon the wookie was using, Harry apparated to the wookies position erected a shield, and started trying to work out how the thing worked. One derisive snort later from his friend saw his new gun plucked from his hands and the wookies dumped in his. A few sharp movements later and the wookie was back to shooting. Promising himself to do something embarrassing to his friend later, Harry lined up a shot and squeezed the trigger. The recoil was on par with a rifle from his memories, but the projectile was one of the red light beams he'd been seeing everywhere. He missed, the beam sputtered and made a scorch mark several feet from where he'd been aiming. Another snort from his friend prompted him to keep firing. It took several attempts before he got a shot grouping good enough to cause the lizards to seek cover, grouping up behind several crates. Taking the opportunity, Harry apparated. Reappearing directly behind the group of six, he used his left hand to sweep across his body at chest height, releasing a cutting curse as he did so.

Repeating the tactic, he soon had the hangar clear of enemies. They were making progress, the wookie was proving to be far more adept at the close quarters combat of the corridors they were traversing than he was, leaving behind several bodies in their wake. They'd gone through several junctions, and just as many turns. Without the wookie, Harry would have been seriously lost, not that he knew where they were right now. Taking another turn, left this time, they came to what could pass as a cafeteria, a medium sized room filled with benches and tables with several trays, containing what could pass as abandoned food scattered across them. Pausing to inspect one of the laden trays, he grimaced at the smell and queasy feeling the sight gave him. He took the rumble from the wookie to be agreement as they moved on into another corridor. It took maybe 10 minutes, a lift, several bloody encounters and eleven more corridors to reach the semi circular control room. They were expected. Close to a score of the lizards had their weapons trained on them when they opened the door. Harry took two bolts to the chest and another to the arm before he fell to the ground. The wookie suffered more. Harry counted five cauterised holes on his friends body slumped against the doorway. Working through the pain even as his wounds healed, he erected a shield over the two of them as he laid his left hand on the body. He'd not loose the first person he'd count as a friend after his long sleep. One of the lizards, the commander if he had to guess was standing just beyond the shield talking at them. Dismissing him for the moment, Harry allowed the ring on his left hand to be seen. Focusing deeply, he reached for the rings magic and turned the stone.

It started as a breeze in the bridge. A low pulse of air wafted over the slumped forms. The trandoshans were puzzled, the trap had worked perfectly, both of the intruders were down, so why was their a shield over the bodies? The commander swaggered up to them, belittling the duos sanity for daring to attack him on his ship. The breeze gently gained strength, causing the commanders uniform to gently rustle. The human was moving behind the shield, sneering the commander lent closer to the shield edge and described just what he was going to do with him once the shield ran out of power. The other trandoshans briefly laughed at this, before being silenced as the wind turned into a gale. Electricity started sparking from the terminals as the room started to shudder. The commander demanded to know what was going even as loose items came crashing from their resting places. The gale intensisified, trandoshans started screaming as they were lifted from their feet. The terminals were burning, acrid smoke pouring from them as the lights flickered then burst. All over the ship electrical terminals surged and exploded, systems failed. The growing fires reached the power core, trailing the surges in power, engineers scrambled but were too slow to prevent the surging currents from feeding into the generator. It overloaded, blowing a 50 metre section of ship to pieces and cutting power from the engines. The ship fell.

Harry reached for the wookie's soul, calling for it to return to its body. Everything was muted here, he only registered colour as shades of grey, nothing was solid, every soul that had form lost it quickly as they bled into anothers. Shades clamoured for his attention, begging to be allowed another chance at life, some seemed to burn with an inner light, he dismissed them, he had little time. There were so many to sort through. Thousands of them reached for him, all pressed together in a grey haze of smoky mass. Calling further upon the rings power the mass parted. There, the wookie. Gesturing for the shade it drifted to him, the other souls increased their efforts, straining at the stones power over them. Extending his hand, Harry formed the conduit through himself and to the wookies body. Slowly, the wookie lost its form and wrapped itself around the hand, harry pulled the soul through himself. The realm lurched, a sensation of foul violation permeated the grey expanse. The souls screamed Harry paused in severing the connection. A dark mass bled across the boundaries of his perception. Harry turned, and witnessed a swirling black sun. It lazily spun above what harry perceived to be the ground. The souls drifted away as fast as they could manage. A black tendril of power snaked from the sun and flickered across Harry's boundary, and gave a distorted hiss as it was repulsed. A presence tried to force its way into his mind. Harry concentrated and flung it away. The sun pulsed angrily, the tendril flailed then shot out to the side piercing a bright soul and dragged it to itself. Harry cut the connection. He awoke to a sensation of falling. Looking up to the window of the control room his eyes widened. His view was dominated by a rapidly approaching tree line, too exhausted to apparate, he reinforced his protego, closed his eyes and passed out.


	2. Chapter 2

Stirring the Pot chapter 2

Yoda was relieved, five Republic light assault cruisers had taken position in orbit. One trandoshan vessel had escaped but the other was being forcibly grounded even as he directed the mop up of the last few slaver groups that refused to put down their arms. Most had simply surrendered at the site of Yoda standing over the field commanders body. Turning his attention west, and the smoke rising from the downed vessel. Yoda sincerely hoped that the individual 'Harry' would continue to be cooperative. The security tapes of his interview backed up the idea of him not being hostile, but all of the evidence to the contrary littered the streets in the form of misshapen transports, not to mention the damage to the plaza. He'd sent for the interviewing officer and dispatched her to the search and sweep team. He had no illusions as to the likelihood of this Harry making it out alive from the crashed ship and sending someone who he knew should help, for his presence whilst muted, was still strong. Once this mess had been dealt with, then he'd see about a personal meeting.

 **Scene shift-downed pirate craft**

Sheowtulla was tired, bone tired. He'd been shot, several times judging from the partially healed burns on his chest. He remembered the bridge, and being gunned down. He thought he remembered smoke and a sense of calm. He'd awoken in darkness, body aching and simply wanting to go back to sleep. Feeling his way around he'd found a light stick in one of his pouches. After lighting it he'd taken in the site of several trandoshan bodies, all dead, good. Turning around he'd come face to foliage with a shattered piece of tree that had punctured clean through the view port. Everything was broken, the only light source was his own. A groan came from the debris. Scraping cabling and broken terminals away, he found a foot. Wrong shape and color for a Trandoshan. That's when it hit him, the human! Frantic now, he hurled debris away as he dug the human out. Lifting the human, he paused. Gunfire was echoing through the corridors, help must be close. Hefting the human over his shoulder he armed himself and set out.

Jaina was nervous, she'd had orders directly from master Yoda and had been attached to the recovery team. It had taken ten minutes by air to reach the downed craft and set up a cordon. The wookies and other security personnel had taken several trandoshan prisoners, but had been forced to kill at least a dozen others. They were making their way from the midsection of the ship. It had crashed front first and settled in a listed position making progress difficult even without the surviving trandoshans. She had been instructed to find the strange human, Harry, and bring him back for some rather more intense questioning. She'd been given permission to use stunners if necessary. Clambering through the twisted remains of what used to be the ships canteen, Jaina nearly lost her head to a red blaster bolt. Ducking into the debris she fired several shots at the shots point of origin. Her support team took up firing positions and also returned fire. A growl reverberated through the room, startling her into lowering her weapon. A wookie was emerging from the corridor ahead. Barking a stand down order, she watched as the wookie scrambled over an overturned metal table. Wait, was that a human body over its shoulder?

Jaina had transferred the human to the medics as soon as the wookie let him go. The wookie was proving far more difficult. It was obviously wounded, but was refusing treatment. She'd had to get two other wookies to strong arm him to the medics, and they'd had to sit on him if the noises coming from the triage tent was any indication. The human had easily been identified as Harry, she'd taken one look at his garb and known who he was. To further embellish the strangeness, preliminary diagnosis from the med droid indicated several indicators of recently incurred, now healed, injuries. Injuries that had not been present in their original briefing session. She knew, with absolute certainty that he had not had any medical treatment since he came to their attention. Another, and more major problem was that the med droid had attempted to take a blood sample. She really did not want to explain to the security offices med team just why the, on loan, droids injector apparatus had melted on contact with Harry's blood. This was going to be a headache, even without the repairs to the city, general cleanup and taking stock as to the losses. With master Yoda present, any mistake, real or perceived could very well cost her. As soon as he was stable he'd be transferred to a proper medical facility and then, in all likelihood into jedi hands. Good thing he was unconscious already.

 **Scene shift-Undisclosed location**

Plagueis was not an idiot, obsessive over his research maybe, but a far cry from an idiot. He was extremely unimpressed with Sidious right now. The weakling had just spent the last 20 minutes trying to cover up for his blunders via long range comms. He had sensed the entity Sidious had encountered the moment his dangerously close to disembowelment apprentice had let his veil waver. Ever since, he'd kept an interested eye on what was happening. It had been child's play to intercept and decode the Jedi's transmission, almost easier was getting a live feed on the Jedi temple when that diminutive nuisance Yoda had issued his orders. What was stirring the anger within Plagueis, besides his apprentices ineptitude and failing attempt at deceit was the entities influence over the force. The ripples of power he had been feeling felt like being set on fire, cut, and stabbed. Numbing the sensations he had reached into the force as he was accustomed, sifting through the eddies of life and death with ease. However at extending his senses to the strange emanations from Kashyyk, he had been blocked. Blocked! Him the supreme authority on the mysteries of the force and the power to alter the state of death itself. He had tried to latch onto the obstacle, but had instead snagged a recently killed Jedi Knight instead. His anger had led to him ripping the force presence of the Jedi asunder before he had the presence of mind to delve into the ghosts thoughts. So here he was, a hairsbreadth away from ordering his wayward apprentice to attend him, in order to rip the information from his mind before personally throttling the whelp. Plagueis considered his options, the entity was now inactive, Yoda had it, his apprentice was attempting to elude his just punishments. Perhaps it was time to see just what his apprentice had been up to, he would know as soon as the time was right to acquire this new entity. Perhaps it would yield some interesting results. For now he would activate some of his contingency plans, with or without his apprentice, he would not be stayed from his research.

 **Scene shift-Orbit of Naboo**

Palpatine had recovered, enough to appease his masters demands of an audience at any rate. He hoped his master did not see through his lies, every moment Plagueis thought of him as not a threat was time he could use. He'd returned to Naboo in order to consolidate his power and ensure the support of the new queen, Padme Amidala. He would need her support for now, in order to expand his operations on Coruscant. Soon he would have no need of her and his primary plan could begin. He'd received a message from the pirates, they had failed, unsurprisingly. The escape of one vessel was unexpected, further evidence that the Republic was woefully under-prepared for what he had in mind for it. No matter, a single Trandoshan pirate party would pose little threat to him. He wondered what Harry had done to cause the sensations he had felt even whilst sedated, at one point he'd felt as if the bacta was boiling him alive. Promising himself to access as much security footage as he could his hands on, Palpatine turned his mind to other matters. The bounty hunter, fett, had arrived on Kamino without the hunters guild knowledge, or any security force alert to the republic. Dooku was coming along nicely and the acolyte maul, he had several targets in mind for him. The trade federation had ramped up its droid production, and shifted several factories to combat models. The Banking Clan had started to quietly take control of its assets security away from republic security, replacing forces and vessels . The foundations were solidifying for his plan. At least that was going as planned. Tiredly, Palpatine braced himself for his impending meeting with the new Queen, he could not afford to act in any manner besides subservient, one day, he would take his rightful place.

 **Scene shift-Kashyyk, medical facility**

 **Rude awakenings**

It was with no small sense of trepidation that Harry allowed himself to rejoin the land of the living. He was tired, all he wanted was to go back to sleep. But, regrettably, someone or something was leaning on his arm, causing it to go numb, no doubt to get him to face the world. He really didn't want to abandon the supremely comfortable pillow and bed he was inhabiting. The weight grew, sharpening his focus, he could hear voices now. Groggily, Harry capitulated to the demands of his need to know what was happening. Opening his eyes brought discomfort, the room was a near blinding white, and a light was soon shoved into his eyes then removed. People were talking, he could make out two forms leaning over him. He recognized the woman, Jaina something or other, from that interview room with the droid . Speaking of droids, now that he could see beyond the light, it was being held in a long spindly attachment to a droid on his right side. The droid seemed to be humming as well. Rousing himself entirely, he tried to tune in to the conversation.

"I understand that the subject is to be transferred immediately into Jedi custody but his condition is not stable." Jaina frowned at the med droids words. She had her orders, deliver Harry to Yoda for questioning. However if the droid was to be believed, from what little the droid had been able to glean, indicated that Harry was in a form of heart failure if the droids scanner was correct. This had been the third med droid to examine Harry, the others had all diagnosed a form of heart failure, and the attempt to draw blood had ended the same way as the first. She refused to take the risk of having Harry die on her watch. Strangely enough from what little medical training she herself had, he was fine, just unconscious. Complicating matters, her commanding officer had demanded she transfer him immediately, several times, despite Harry's condition. Almost on que, her official communicator began to buzz again. Checking the ID, verified what she already knew, the commander was back. Resigned to the fact that she was out of time she addressed the droid. "Wake him up, now." The droid, predictably started objecting. She repeated her order. The droid brought up another objection, "The only method available to this unit in order to wake the subject as intravenous medication is not usable, is to deploy this units defibrillator unit." That caught her off guard. Her communicator was still beeping, she was going to be fired if she didn't do something. Swallowing her discomfort she gave the droid the go ahead. "Do it."

He should have stayed in suspension, Harry mused whilst cradling his chest, taking in the wrecked room, alarms and shouting rapidly approaching. He'd been coming around, honestly, and what does the robot do? Plants a metal paddle on his chest and hits him with a lightning bolt. Anyone would be excused for jumping off the bed and casting a point blank blasting hex. Though he could have done without the officer lady being in the room, now slumped against the wall and half hidden behind his overturned former bed. It mollified him somewhat that the robot had only exploded into shrapnel away from himself and the officer. He'd just recovered from his cumulative efforts over the past day after all, and he still felt dead on his feet. The shouting was just outside the room now, adopting what he hoped was the symbol for surrender here as it was in his prior life he raised his hands and knelt on the floor. The door, which was only somewhat askew burst open. Three Wookies had him on the floor and in what felt like cuffs before he could even try and get an explanation out. Unlike last time, they weren't quite so gentle, or letting him walk. Raising his head from the Wookies elbow he looked over the room. A humanoid with what looked to be tentacles coming out the back of its head was crying over the small pile of scrap that once was the droid, whilst another was checking the officer lady over. The Wookies growled at each other and they were moving. He was being carried through what looked suspiciously like a hospital if the number of people of all descriptions sporting slings and walking aids was any indication. No one took kindly to people blowing things up in hospitals, he was definitely in trouble. He'd been trying so hard to get them to like him too. This was definitely going into the scrapbook for shit Harry had done to piss off the bystander.

 **Meeting, at last.**

Finally, Yoda was going to have his talk with the newcomer Harry, he'd had time to make sure a first contact droid from his own shuttle had been brought in-order to ease the conversation. Harry was at this moment being bodily escorted to himself and the Republic security forces commander who had led the relief ships. Whatever had happened to delay the meeting had resulted in a forcibly decommissioned med-droid and a concussion for the supervising officer. He had the report and the surveillance. Commander Rennint Chartan, a human native from Yanna, from the relief force was calling for the immediate isolation of Harry and wanted him stunned and restrained before the interview took place. Yoda had personally countermanded those orders. What had happened in the hospital was an accident, and all evidence, excluding the hospital supported the theory Harry was a non hostile. At least, to them, the Wookie who had been accompanying him, Sheowtulla, was quite emphatic on that point. The entourage would arrive momentarily, centering himself, Yoda meditated, tuning out the commander with all the ease dealing with younglings for centuries had gifted him. Instead keeping his senses focused on the approaching security transport and its passenger of interest, he had yet to identify just what this humans force signature meant, and figure out just what it was doing to the Wookie in closest proximity to it. Yoda frowned, if this Harry was using the force to influence the Wookies, he best have an escape before he got to the landing platform.

Harry had spent the last ten minutes wondering just what it would take to get the Wookie carrying him let him down. Normally he would have gone with a stinging hex, but considering the mess he'd made he really didn't want to be on the receiving end of someone who he knew for a fact could rip his arms and legs off. He would need to be subtle, anything that made a light would probably be taken as an attack. That narrowed it to a charm, tripping charm? No he didn't want to be squashed. Another cheering charm would probably get him searched for drugs. Recalling his days with George Weasely and their experimentation of spells, he settled for an itching charm. It did exactly what the name implied, made someone, so long as they had nerves, itch. They had never made it public that it was a spell rather than some ground down candies that they had enchanted, allowing them to undercut Zonko's that little bit more. Moving his cuffed arms caused some minor protest in his wrists, but he needed contact. Coming into contact with his ride he applied a weak version of the charm and slowly fed it a small amount of power to make it grow. It took another five minutes of feeding the charm incremental amounts of magic before the Wookie lost composure, and by then he was in another flying craft. The Wookies uncomfortable shifting turned into an idle scratch. The scratching progressed until Harry was released and pushed into a seat of his own. Harry cut the magic, pleased with himself. It had taken so little power he felt barely winded in his current exhausted state. The Wookie took another few minutes to stop scratching, amidst what could only be laughter from his compatriots. Another five minutes later, they landed. Harry was surprised to find himself lifted into the air, and not by a Wookie. Looking around and reaching out with his tired senses he located the source. A rather elderly, green house elf, with its hand outstretched was levitating him. The small creature waved its other hand and Harry felt the pulse of power that rippled through the air. It felt like a cleansing for dark magic and stopped any thoughts of apparition he may have had in their tracks. There went his attempt at subtlety, his charm-work had been discovered, so much for going unnoticed. The creature gestured and he was pulled forward.

It took perhaps five minutes by Yoda's reckoning to secure Harry in a chair, all the while keeping a gentle but firm force grip on the man. Yoda could tell, Harry was fighting the urge to try and overpower his hold, his force signature was tightly controlled despite the prickling it caused against his own. The contact droid had started working, beginning with the wyrmspeech that by all rights a human should not physically be capable of speaking, and introducing new terms in both basic and whatever tongue Harry considered his native. Commander Chertin was fidgeting, clearly impatient with the proceedings. Yoda allowed the droid its time. He had established one clear command for it, determine what Harry had been doing, and relay the information back. Once the commander had his report, he would no longer be needed here, then Yoda could get to the bottom of the Sith presence. It took another fifteen minutes for the droid and Harry to be done, and some surreptitious calming of the commander from Yoda. They listened attentively, the commander with several exclamations of disbelief and demands for more information. Everything matched with Yoda's own conclusions from the events and provided security footage with the relevant witness statement from the Wookie that had accompanied much of Harry's endeavors . Later, in the privacy of his meditation chamber, Yoda would entertain the thought of recommending a reposting for the commander, he really needed to learn the difference between interrogation and interview. Surveying their guest, Yoda marveled at the difference in his force signature, old, primal, different. Yet currently operating in a sluggish manner, tired, perhaps? Gently, he folded the few probes Harry sent his way back onto their point of origin, Harry's signature sharpened, as if expecting an attack, then eased back into its previous sluggish state. Definitely tired.

Harry was fascinated by this droid, though somewhat peeved by the house elf in the floating chair containing him in his own, grounded chair. The droid had started in parseltongue, then asked him to recount his part in the lizards, no Trandoshans, slave raid, first in parseltongue then in english. Seeing no reason to lie, he hadn't been subtle after all, he started from the explosion in the security building. What really impressed him was the droids attempt to teach him the language common to everyone who wasn't a Wookie, whilst learning his own. It took longer than he was comfortable with, seeing as how he was currently being held in position. But in the end, the droid stopped talking to him and started talking to the other two present. The human in the uniform, seemed to not be satisfied and looked to be demanding things if the voice level was anything to go by. The old elf in the robe, hadn't said a word, simply appearing to listen whilst weaving whatever magic it was doing around him in a pattern that felt not hostile, or friendly but, other. This unnerved him far more than the human. If it came to a fight, he could escape. However judging from the magic, and the metal cylinder that he was sure was another light sword, in his current tired state, it would not go nearly as smoothly as his previous encounter did. Any attempts to sense within the old elf resulted in a gentle constriction of the weave holding him in place, preventing him from judging its intention. Hopefully, it was going to be friendly. The uniformed human abruptly stood, and just as Harry focused on him, he barged out of the room, grumbling something on the way out. Looking back to the old elf, he realized the real reason he was here was about to be revealed.

The droid finished relating the tale, and commander Chertin left for the republic embassy, evidently unsatisfied and looking for more answers. The room was his, the Wookies would not tolerate any surveillance at his request, only his personal recorder mounted on his comm unit would hold a record to be entered into the archives upon his return to the temple. Addressing the droid and telling it to transmit the conversation both ways, he begun his inquiry. "Encountered a Sith, earlier today in the forest you did. Two jedi are dead, what happened?" Harry's response, understandably fragmented, caught him somewhat by surprise, though if Harry's information was distorted due to a difficulty with the translation, he could not tell. "I emerged from my sleeping chamber, and found the red blade user, the Sith, standing over the body of a child on my boundary. Sith and I talked briefly, his name was Darth. He tried to use his, magic, to subjugate my own. I tried to capture Darth for killing child and trying to control me. We fought, Darth was hurt, Wookies came, Darth escaped. Wookies brought me here." Yoda's mind took in the information and found his estimation of Harry climbing. Without any knowledge of Sith or Jedi, Harry had tried to capture the Sith, simply for killing the padawan, and apparently wounded the Sith. He couldn't do much with the rest, send a team to investigate the battle site maybe, and check the medical facilities for the very unlikely chance the Sith used one before escaping. From the time he had felt the first emamations of Harry's peculiar use of the force, he could estimate the Sith's time of escape, the flight recorders in Rwookrrorro's control tower might have caught the Sith's ship exiting the atmosphere.

Harry breathed deeply, the elf, Yoda, had released his hold on him. It felt good to stretch, you never have to move something until you can't. The conversation had revealed some very interesting things, the Jedi and the Sith, seemed to be mortal enemies if the description Yoda had given was to be trusted. Sith, firmly entrenched in the dark and the Jedi in a somewhat narrow interpretation of the light, how they achieved this whilst retaining a healthy mental state he was unsure. So the child had died because it had been a Jedi in training. Though from Yoda's description that would have simply been a bonus to the Sith rather than a reason to single him out for death. The Trandoshans were heavily involved in piracy across much of the galaxy, and wasn't that fascinating, the galaxy. Yoda had stated a desire to take him to a planet called Coruscant, apparently the centre for the 'Republics' government, and location of his Jedi temple. What he knew as magic seemed to be called the force here, and from what he'd seen so far, manifested differently from even Psionics, as apart from the lightning, he'd not observed or felt any elementalism whatsoever. Things like transfiguration and even most charms did not appear to feature at all. He'd tried to keep vague as to the extent of his abilities after learning that. He'd caught the attention of the Sith, simply due to his presence feeling strange, and Yoda had seen the fiendfyre first hand, guaranteeing the Jedi would not leave him alone if he asked. Harry had his own priority, he wanted to find out what it was he'd felt/seen when using the resurrection stone, and satisfying the agenda's of any organisation claiming metaphysical power beyond the regular person was not high in his list of things to do. Perhaps the Wookies could put in a word for him? Unlikely, Jedi seemed to be the top of the everyone does what we say because we are always right pile. Yoda seemed nice enough, but Harry was not naïve after dealing with his own worlds politics. A third option needed to be made, how to go about it without causing a galactic incident was the question. It would help too, if he could keep the droid.

 **Decisions, resistance and legging it**

He'd been given a rather comfortable room in the embassy. Yoda had apparently made arrangements to keep him comfortable whilst the cleanup was underway, he'd even been allowed to keep the droid. He spent an interesting few minutes going over the room, droid in tow, examining all of the little devices he could find. He'd nearly blasted a hole in the wall after discovering the shower didn't use water. Holographics, instant access to a system similar in design, but far greater in breadth than the internet, strange fruits of odd taste and a door system he refused to trust until he located the sensor. All of these things, whilst amusing, failed to divert him from going over what he needed to do next. The Wookies, had so far been universally friendly, apart from a few notable and understandable incidents. That Sith fellow needed to be either put down or locked up. The Jedi, if Yoda was an accurate reflection, were nice enough, at least as far as he could tell, but Harry wasn't naïve. He had publicly utilised powers that apparently neither Sith or Jedi were capable of. Both had obvious extreme influence in the greater, galactic, situation, albeit the Sith in different circles to the Jedi. He wanted to see the stars. He wanted to try and find what survived from his time, how had humans survived? Where were the goblins? What happened? Contemplating his awakening it was reasonable to assume there would be some trace on Kashyyk. The humans had obviosuly survived and prospered, but what of the goblins? No one, to his knowledge was capable of finding goblins who wanted to stay hidden except a wielder of magic, and it was reasonable to assume he was now unique in that regard. Harry stopped himself, first he would need help from the Wookies. This was their planet, they might buy him some time before Yoda tried to take him to his temple. Turning his mind to the events of the pastday Harry found his starting point. What better place to start than a friend? Turning to the droid, he asked it how to go about finding someone.

Jaina was having a seriously bad day, commander chertin, the highest ranking officer in the relief force was demanding answers she didn't have, threatening to dock her pay for the lost med droids if she didn't get the information, and also demanding access to the VIP suite which currently housed the person of interest that she was guarding. Simultaneously she was trying to keep a Wookie, who was looking for the subject of the commanders ire, calm. She'd awoken with a concussion after the blast. She'd not expected Harry to so violently respond. On reflection, she should have expected something, he was an obvious force user and the general theory was that force use was linked to a persons emotional state. Nothing else would have roused him though. Injectable and oral medications were out, that's how they'd lost that first droid. Slapping him hadn't even caused him to stir, neither had using the edge of her boot knife to prick him, she needed a new one now. Chertin, whilst her current overall superior could not countermand her other orders. Jedi Grandmaster Yoda had assigned her to be Harry's supervising officer personally. She was to let no one besides Yoda himself, and anyone he accompanied access to Harry. So here she was, nursing a killer headache, trying to ignore the spittle being flung all over her face by a purpling Chertin, rapidly loosing the battle in keeping the Wookie from brushing her aside if his fur bristling was anything to go by, and internally lamenting the impending loss of her job. Normally she would have called security, but you can't call security on the securities current overall boss.

It was the shouting that drew him out of his room, darting past the door before it could close on him, despite the droids protests. It was the sight of the purple faced officer he'd met earlier that made him start to back up. What made him stop however, was the very furry, and now very familiar feeling of being engulfed in a Wookies arms. At least this time it was a hug if he guessed correctly that the rumbles coming from where his head was squished were happy noises. It took several gasps of air, some vain attempts at flailing and what he was sure was a bruised rib before the Wookie let him down again. Apart from a few patches of what could have been burns, he looked okay. As the unifier of the Hallows, the stone allowed him to pull a newly dead soul into a recently deceased body. But he had to use his magic to ensure the body was capable of living, or better yet, still functioning. He had been so tired and rushed, that he hadn't been sure if he'd done it right. The first time he had tried, he'd lost the soul and inadvertently made a corpse bomb instead. Patting the Wookies arm he noted that its name, courtesy of the droid, was Sheowtulla. Sheowtulla however seemed to have more than a hug on his mind. Harry very nearly face planted into the wall at the cuff to the head that was delivered, and had to hold his ringing skull in his hands as he was treated to a long string of derisive, but affectionate comments, dutifully translated for him in parseltongue by the droid. It was here, the purple faced officer intervened.

Harry had tried to be polite, understanding and helpful. But the man had it coming. Chertin, the officer, had near blank accused him of being responsible for the trandoshan raid. Furthermore he had stated, without room for misinterpretation that he was, if the there had been a Jedi Knight and his padawan killed, responsible for both deaths and Harry would be dragged, in chains if necessary, to the nearest planet that still endorsed the death penalty to stand trial. Harry was sure, that the man would have lost his head, or at least an appendage if he hadn't acted before Sheowtulla finished growling. It was guiltily satisfying to turn Chertins, who already sported something of a gut, hair and eye colour to match Vernon Dursely's before making two 3 foot walrus tusks sprout from his mouth. The man had been so caught up in his threats he didn't notice anything had changed until Harry silenced him for good measure. The startled gasp to his left brought his attention to the other, rather more familiar officer.

Jaina could only stare at the commander. His dark brown hair had turned blonde, his eyes had changed to the colour blue from brown and he had grown tusks. She recalled a data holo on the natives of Felucia, the tusks would not have been out of place. Perhaps blessedly so for her head, the commander had lost his ability to speak. He was gesturing wildly now, clawing at his throat as his already purple face deepened in colour. Looking over to the slack jawed Wookie, and the smiling Harry she grabbed him by the front of his robes. "Do you have any idea how much trouble you've just caused?! As soon as whatever you've just done wears off, he's going to call out the security team and have all of us arrested." As soon as she finished speaking, Chertin stopped his gesturing and reached for his pocket. Jaina, knowing what he was going for, seized his arm in a subdue hold. Chertin's wide eyes was the last thing she saw as she snagged his standard issue emergency beacon before a red light engulfed her vision. She never heard the quiet murmur of 'stupefy' that proceeded it.

Sloppy, and stupid. All Harry had wanted was to make the man shut up by embarrassing him. He hadn't meant to potentially trigger his own manhunt. Sheowtulla had taken a moment to recover after the stunning, but had immediately set about confiscating Chertins pistol and whatever it was the woman officer had taken, whilst checking them for heartbeats. The stupefy would wear off in an hour or so, as would the tusks. The eye and hair colouration might take a day, the silencing spell lifted the moment he stunned them. Sighing, he levitated the man into a sitting position as Sheowtulla picked up the woman. Sheowtulla growled a query, he hardly needed the droid to tell him what was asked. "What now?" Out of everything he'd done today, this topped the list of stupid things. Falling into his old Auror protocol, he carefully wiped Chertins memory to the point he would not remember making it to the corridor outside his room. In its place Harry instilled a deep feeling of tiredness. Being careful not to bang Chertins head on the wall he gently placed him in a chair around the corner from the corridor his room was situated in. Placing the timed notice me not was simple. Deciding what to do with the female officer was not.

Being knocked out more than once a day sucked, was Jaina's first coherent thought as she opened her eyes to a very close Wookie face. Fighting the urge to startle she managed to only jerk a little as a metallic voice came to her attention. "Officer Jaina, VIP Harry wants to inquire what is to be done about getting away from commander Chertin?" The Wookie had stood back, that was a relief, she had nothing against the normally gentle giants but she didn't want to wake up near nose to nose with one. Looking to her left she identified the droid that had spoken to her, and the VIP, Harry. Jumping to her feet she reached for her blaster, only to freeze on feeling the holster empty. Harry raised his hand, her blaster was in it. He opened his hand and suddenly, all of her panic, her general sense of depression at the day, her irritation with Chertin, and her fear, melted away. Relaxing she answered, "I would suggest taking an embassy speeder to Sheowtulla's home village, then contacting master Yoda to smooth things over." Harry lowered the hand containing her blaster, then stepped forward and said directly to her without the droid, a strange timbre to his voice "Do not, shoot me." Jaina only nodded as he placed the blaster in her holster. Then her panic came back and she immediately took off for the speeders. Harry watched her tear off sadly, as Sheowtulla asked what had just happened, he didn't like doing what he had just done, but it solved the immediate problems. He never noticed the small sensors embedded in the ceiling that recorded the whole exchange as he proceeded to follow.

 ** **Authors Note****

Firstly thankyou to everyone who reviewed, your comments, questions and ideas have been highly appreciated, please keep them coming.

Thankyou Eurospawn, for taking the time to help me, would have taken far longer without your help and ideas.

I apologize for the delay in getting this out but have been on continued assignment for work (still am). Unfortunately I am away often and for long periods so can't promise to remedy the situation.


	3. Chapter 3

Stirring the Pot chapter 3

Sidious paced across the palace atrium impatiently. He needed to be elsewhere, but the new queen, Amidala, had demanded his presence, his time was far more precious than hers. A queen of a single world, not even one that could account for the entire population was hardly worth his attention. He longed for the day when he wouldn't need to submit himself to her authority and exchange the meaningless pleasantries that made up his role as senator. He had set up everything in preparation for the confrontation with his master. The droids had been stationed on the cargo haulers used to normally transport subjects for experimentation. Plagueis was paranoid about his own safety, yet so sure in his apparent immortality. Sidious had acquired an artifact from Korriban that should counter that particular problem. Even so, he had to be careful. He could feel the presence of Plagieus ghosting through the force, seeking for him. Suppressing a shudder and quickening his pacing, he turned his thoughts to the new player in the galaxy, Harry Potter; a seemingly innocuous name for someone capable of generating a force signature strong enough for a Sith lord to hide from another in its echo in a different system. The kill team that Plagieus had despatched would fail, and how Harry would react would be most interesting. His newest puppet, Maul, was tying up the loose end the pirates presented. Lost in his thoughts, he nearly missed the double doors leading to the throne room opening. Sidiouss fought down a snarl and plastered a smile over his face. One day, his days of servitude and this tedium, would be over.

 **Friendly Locals and Pursuit**

Harry needed to learn how to fly- he was sitting on his hands to keep himself from grabbing the controls as the small group sped over the treetops. Sheowtulla was driving, surprisingly adept at handling the controls designed for someone significantly smaller. The officer who he had confounded, Jaina, was staring at him, trying to figure out what was going on as she repeatedly failed to get her gun into her hands without dropping it. The droid, well the droid was trying to wrench itself free from the back of the speeder where Harry had applied a sticking charm. It was making strangely distressed noises for a machine. Once they had landed, Harry planned to start searching for anything that might have survived. Whilst he wasn't particularly attached to anything from before his self-imposed sleep, he knew something out there had survived. Ever since that first meeting with Yoda and the persistent questing from someone trying to worm into his head from a direction that he could only describe as up, he had ramped up both his sensing and his occluding. There was something familiar out in the forest, it felt, close to magic but, dormant. Closing his eyes, Harry allowed the wind to wash over him, soaking up the sun as it made its descent over the horizon. He would find whatever it was out there, learn to fly these vehicles, and then see what was waiting beyond the sky.

In high orbit a small craft disengaged from lightspeed and disappeared from the sensors of the republic security force ships. It drifted on low power, maintaining its position over the planet. In the flight control tower of Kashykks central command, a program was activated by remote signal and a new signal was broadcast on an encrypted line to a small bunker on the planet's surface. A long unused power station slowly came to life, sending energy thrumming through several systems until it reached a purpose-built transmitter scanner. From orbit, a search command was issued and the scanner began its work. Ten minutes later, the scanner acquired its targets coordinates and transmitted them to the ship. On-board, the power was increased in the shielded cargo bay. Twenty black droids and two dull grey ones came online, the vessel began a slow descent as the droids completed a series of equipment checks. In the bunker, a timer began its countdown as power was rerouted to a fluid-filled tank that held suspended in its confines a distorted form larger than a Wookie.

The village was interesting. Harry had been right; the Wookies were using the trees as biological power plants. evidenced by the cabling he could see seemingly sprouting from the trees themselves. Sheowtulla was having an urgent sounding discussion with a much taller Wookie wearing a strange headdress. The droid was attempting to calm down Jaina, who was hyperventilating at her inability to draw on him. From what Harry could hear, as he wandered over to the Wookies, Sheowtulla was winning. The large Wookie then turned to him and addressed him directly. Harry smiled, in a hopefully friendly way. Then the Wookie offered its hand to him, rendering him surprised, as no one else thus far had offered a handshake. Taking the huge paw, he winced as his bones were ground together. Taking the nod to be one of approval evidenced by the fact his arm was still attached, he managed to offer a genuine smile through the pain. Sheowtulla came between them then and led him away. The group led by Sheowtulla made its way across several platforms and timbre bridges. Coming up to a home in a tree, Sheowtulla made a happy bark noise at the two Wookies standing outside of its door, the following embrace solidified the thought of them being family. One round of overly enthusiastic hugs later found Harry and Jaina seated somewhat stiffly at a sturdy wooden table with several bowls of food-or at least what Harry hoped was food-plonked in front of them.

The droids had landed, twenty kilometres south of the last location transmitted to them. The grey droids sent the security code to receive orders. The primary target had a rapid mode of transport, conclusion aerial travel and rate of speed suggested speeder. The current location of the transmitters source was stationary in the indigenous village that one of the target's companions originated from. Primary target and by extension secondaries would likely remain in place for a minimum of the next eight hours, assuming continued travel come the morning. Team A would engage the primary directly and eliminate secondaries, Team B would disable all modes of transport, then eliminate secondaries. Should either team fail or be discovered, both teams would engage primary target directly. Should the mission take more than 16 hours upon receiving the orders, or if the teams were destroyed, the contingency would activate. All effort was to be made to capture the primary intact and alive if possible; however intact and deceased was also acceptable. As the last of the orders were received the droid teams moved, specially designed servos making no noise despite the weight of their armoured carapace.

Jaina was questioning her sanity, the things she had seen, and the chaos that was her current mental state. Combined with her own damned inability to even point her weapon at the centre of all the madness, was causing her a considerable amount of stress. Not to mention-the fact that she was being treated to a Wookie family dinner with said centre of madness after stealing a speeder from her own unit simply topped things off. The droid now standing outside- as Wookies didn't like droids in general- had been no help whatsoever. Apparently Yoda had left standing orders that she was to be held accountable for Harry's activities until a Jedi escort could be arranged whilst he was helping track the escaped Trandoshan vessel. The rational part of Jaina knew that Harry had only been helpful so far and that his highly apparent limited understanding of what once had been her reality was the cause for all this. However, the less rational part of her wanted to scream hysterically as she planted as many shots as she could into his head before Sheowtulla, the Wookie whose parents were happily hosting them, tore her head off. Despite this, she was holding it together-if only just. Turning her attention to the home cooked meal in front of her, Jaina dug in. On her admittedly-in-peril salary, she couldn't afford to turn it down.

 **Headaches, Spidey Sense.**

Harry surrendered in his attempt to help the Wookies cleaning up; more out of a desire not to be smacked over the head than anything. It did let him spend some time to cradle his head in his hands, though. Occlumency was a blessing, but whoever was out there simply refused to give up. Normally Harry would simply grab the intruder and drag them into a specially strung together series of memories and watch them squirm this however, was simply dragging on. The entity was slippery; he couldn't pin it down. That didn't stop it from trying to bore holes into his shields, which was getting very old and was giving him a killer headache. If the damn thing would let up, he'd drop his shields to their basic levels and let his headache recede. But considering he was into the eleventh hour, that seemed unlikely. Additional to this was a weird feeling in the back of his mind, it had been growing ever since he'd been given the protocol droid. Even occlumency wasn't helping in pining it down, and it was making him edgy. Either the entity had somehow bypassed his shields whilst maintaining a presence outside of them, or-more disturbingly-someone or something else was causing it. He could deal with the entity as soon as he pinned it down. Moving to a window, Harry signaled the droid,. He might as well try and learn some of the language in the meantime.

A-01 maintained its course, updating its more powerful computer and keeping its team on track as it went, the village was now in visual range. The light globes used to illuminate the tree walks were pinpricks above the advance droid team. The secondary team was searching for the landing platform to disable any flight-capable craft. The constant data stream from the harvester teams allowed the command droid a precise layout of the village plan above. The targets would be in one of the residences. The comm connection from of the secondary target that they had been tracking was static. The primary team would converge on the base of the tree and then climb. The secondary team would make its way to covering positions on the connecting platforms to cut off escape. Signaling the team onward, it idly reconfirmed the remaining time before the contingency went into effect. The teams would be back in orbit in-assuming no problems-ten hours, prepped for delivery. Then the termination code would be broadcast. A update that the comm beacon was moving resulted in the increase of the teams' speeds by twenty percent, they would complete the mission in the allocated time frame. Failing to complete the mission parameters was grounds for termination, including the parameters relating to the allowed time frame.

Whatever the feeling was, it was getting worse, and the droid wasn't helping as it went into tense structures. Giving up, Harry told it to stay put and left the small home after giving the droid a message as to his whereabouts. Standing on the tree platforms edge, Harry again brushed the entity away with his mind. It wouldn't stop the thing from coming back, but it would give him a few minutes to sort his thoughts out. He wasn't doing too badly, all things considered: the Wookies were nice, the planet was awe-inspiringly beautiful, and he'd met a few beings that could almost pass as magical. Not to mention that the idea of space travel took him back to his flying days. It was regrettable however, that he'd spent most of his time here engaged in one form of combat or at least being interrogated about it- not to mention the compulsion he had placed on Jaina. Sighing, Harry turned his senses outward: everyone was still in the Wookies house, three beings close together suggested the kitchen, and the one pacing up and down was most likely Jaina. Unsurprisingly he couldn't sense the droid. Reaching outward with his senses, beyond the slow thrum of life-force in the trees and the few animals brave enough to come close, he could feel it. The entity was coming back, just as intangible and twisted as before. It suffused the air and spiralled over the village, almost as if it was riding the slow life-force in the trees themselves. Raising his shields again, this time Harry focused inward. That weird niggling feeling was starting to get seriously distracting; it had turned into an itch he couldn't scratch. Shaking his head in an attempt to alleviate the growing pressure, he tensed as the entity again started its work on his shields.

It was the droid that first told Jaina that something was wrong. Its enhanced on-board sensors had picked up several contacts in close proximity. Apparently, Yoda knew the value of early warnings. Wookies, whilst capable of sneaking up on people and climbing up the trunk of a house tree in evenly spaced intervals (particularly in the forest), wouldn't do so in their own village. Entering the kitchen, she relayed the droid's report. The resulting scramble out of the room and into a storage box told her all she needed to know about what was happening. Someone was out there, and it wasn't friendly. Sheowtulla was hefting a trademark bowblaster. His mother was idly swishing a pair of Ryk blades through the air whilst his father was priming a long gun and oversized hand blaster by the door. The droid was stationed in the kitchen, having been bodily dragged there by Sheowtulla. As soon as anyone started shooting, the rest of the village would wake up. Due to the dangers Kashyyk's wildlife posed, Wookies were light sleepers- even in the canopy. Only question, where was Harry?

Harry was growing concerned, something was wrong. He had wandered away from the house to see more of the village, and things weren't right. There was a seriously strange sensation crawling up his spine. He had also noticed that there wasn't anyone around. Earlier, he had seen several sentries wandering the well-lit platforms, but now there were none. Compounding the feeling, several of the ramps were no longer lit and the trees had taken on a intensely creepy feel. He could just make the ramps out in the dark, but wouldn't want to cross one without light. Stretching his senses out and idly swatting the entity away at the same time, he took stock. Everything in the darkened areas was muted and the top of the trees were dark to his life sense. It was almost as if they had been cut off just below the level of the lights. The village itself was slumbering; just about all of the residents were asleep or otherwise in their homes. Two weren't, however-more sentries, perhaps? That feeling was back and it was practically screaming at him now. Frowning at the situation, grim curiosity got the best of him. Casting a lumos from his hand, he made his way over the nearest ramp toward the slowly moving sentries. He broke into a sprint when one of the few remaining lit trees went dark, he switched to direct apparition when both of the sentries' life-forces vanished.

Harry was wandering around the village, looking around. That's the message he had left with the droid. Jaina could just stab the idiot for this. The contacts were holding position just under the tree's platform, and everyone was tense. The first thing to come through that door was dead. With the bowblaster, longrifle, and her own blaster all pointing at it, and the scary way that Sheowtulla's mother was hefting those blades, not much would be getting through. She could just make out the next platform through the windows; it was difficult as the lights had been cut. The Wookies were restless- especially once she pointed out the lack of lights. She had made out the words "trees" and "dead" from the rushed growling, but that was all. Swallowing heavily she shifted from behind the overturned chair to join Sheowtulla behind the large overturned table. The droid was the one to break the silence: "I am detecting numerous additional contacts converging on our position- they are coming from the direction of the landing pad." Jaina was not fluent in Wookie, but she knew that Sheowtulla was being admonished for just using an expletive.

 **Saving Bears**

Harry reappeared with a muffled pop, directly over the body of a Wookie. Illuminating the corpse with his hand, he grimaced at the large cavity in its back. At least, for the Wookie it had been quick. Stretching his senses out, he tried to find the assailant. Nothing living was in the immediate vicinity. So it was with great surprise when a knife tore into his side. Reeling back in shock, he clutched at the wound and stumbled over the Wookie's body. Blinking rapidly, he registered two things; one, his side- whilst in agony- was healing and two, his head was over empty space. The sight of a large stick -crackling with trails of electricity heading for his head -spurred him into action. Hoping he wasn't about to end up inside a tree, he apparated again, this time ten metres to the left. Shakily, he was able to regain his feet. Raising his right hand whilst clutching his wound with the other, he cast a chest height depulso, thrusting forward to increase its intensity. The resulting shockwave swept everything in front of him out into the dark empty space beyond the platform. Straightening fully as his side finished healing he recast his lumos. Unsurprisingly, the body was gone, swept up by his depulso, but rapidly crawling forward like giant insects were several droids. The one closest took a diffindo to the head and stopped moving, while the others leapt to their feet and charged. Swearing, Harry took a strike that greyed his vision and broke his arm as he tried to block it. They were trying to bludgeon him, wielding long batons that arced with energy at the tips rather than the blades he could see poking through their arms and the gun each one carried across their backplates. Apparating again to buy time, Harry focused on his body and channeled. Eyes sparking, he looked into the red visor of the closest charging droid and let the magic flow within him. The droid activated its baton and brought it down, arching for Harry's head. Reaching up, Harry caught the droids arm and pulled. Metal tore and circuitry squealed and sparked as the arm came loose. The droid backed off and its fellows slowed their charge and assumed a semicircle, backing him against the platforms edge. Hefting the claimed arm, Harry's eyes again sparked as he blurred.

Whoever was out there was really starting to wear on Jaina's patience. The occupants of the hamlet had been crouched behind their makeshift cover for a good ten minutes. Nothing. No shots, no attempts at breaching. They just held position. The droid was keeping its sensors on them and noting indicated movement. The Wookies were getting frustrated at the lack of movement. She'd tempted a brief peek over the window, but still nothing. The only thing that had prevented her from attempting to light the area with her torch was the low whine of blasters set to max coming from outside. This had promptly sent her diving back into cover. But they, whoever they were, didn't fire. They were waiting for something. The whine died down after a minute and the concerned rumbling of Sheowtulla's father echoed her thoughts: bait. They were simply bait. She was so going to rip Harry a new one after this.

'Droids', Harry thought as he tore the wiring out of another chest piece, 'were serious pains in the ass to deal with'. The Trandoshans, whilst physically intimidating had been, pleasingly flammable and -honestly- not amongst the best or brightest. Blurring past another baton aimed for his head, Harry caught the offender in a neck hold and squeezed. Metal crumpled under his grip and the droid, minus its head, collapsed twitching. These droids, however, were proving far more difficult to deal with. He couldn't deal with them at range and they had been fast to adapt to his apparition; always in his face, always trying to put him on the defensive. Under normal conditions, he would have been in trouble: he wouldn't have had the skill or power to alter his perception of time and, correspondingly, his body's capabilities. The current droid scrabbled at him, attempting to lock his arms within its torso as he melted his way through. Persistent buggers too –unsurprising, really, considering the apparent lack of initiative. The droid shuddered one last time and finally went limp, he must've destroyed something vital. The others had backed off -new orders, perhaps, or dare he believe in robotic self preservation. The holstering of the batons and subsequent sounds of metal on metal accompanied the unsheathing of blades from the droids arms. Grimly smiling, Harry advanced. New orders then, or if not, he'd forced a change in objective. Well, they'd upped the ante, he supposed he should, as well. He wouldn't put it past his luck that there were more of the things loose. Harry focused inward again with a smile that was all teeth, his eyes losing their previous green and bleeding to red. A grey droid that had so far refused to engage lifted a hand to its wrist, then deployed its own blades. Harry charged.

Their unwelcome guests were moving. Yoda's droid was monitoring them as they withdrew from the platform opposite. Even those under the house were moving, heading after their fellows. Cautiously, Jaina, backed by Sheowtulla, moved to the door. Nodding to the Wookie, she dived through, raised her pistol, and scanned for enemies -all the while praying that she wasn't about to die. Sheowtulla's growl and the blaster discharge had her on her feet and running to the edge of the platform. He was on his belly, bowcaster forward and taking aim. He fired again, but she couldn't see anything. Rumbling to himself, he took a deep breath and again fired. This time, she saw them: several droids, crawling on the underside of the platform away from them. From their size and obvious armament, the first thoughts were highly illegal, and more importantly, highly dangerous. Her last thought before Sheowtulla's father came up behind her and let loose a roar that shook the platform was that she was in over her head. Assassination droids, after her charge. What else? A feral Rancor looking for a new chewtoy? The village was awake and the sound of blaster discharges rent the air. Hefting her pistol, she rushed to join the attack. She had brought this on the village by bringing Harry here, so she would do her part to keep it safe.

"Situation critical, mission parameters unable to be met, recommend failsafe." These were the last encoded words the command droid got out before its optical receptors were consumed with light and its power readings blurred red. It crumpled forward, all operations terminated by the burst of electricity that had fried its circuitry and superheated its chassis. With a soft thump, it collapsed onto itself, torso melting into the slag that had once been its legs. It had become apparent from the outset of the engagement that capture was impossible, so it had relayed secondary protocols: observe and terminate. It had been streaming the combat as it progressed, the varied forms in which their primary had terminated its fellow droids was priority data. Secondary data had been observing the subject itself. The discolouration anomalies of the targets' organic optical receptors, eyes, had also been streamed, as was the abrupt change in combat ability. The command droid expired, never registering the hail of blaster fire that fell upon its combat units from new trajectories -or that its head had been picked up and was being inspected by eyes that reflected red then green from its visor.

 **Scary Teddies, Failsafes**

Fascinating, he mused whilst idly running his fingers over a droids head, it was fascinating how the gentle giants could be roused to such violence. He'd heard the roar, and the returns it had incited. Wookies of all ages had seemingly poured from their houses, from oldest to youngest, each carried a weapon. Children, that came up to his chest each took a droids arm and pulled. He even spied a grey Wookie, moving slowly, gun in hand picking off any droid foolish enough to try and lay down their own fire. The droids had tried to fight back, switching to their heavy guns, but with absolutely zero success. Deadly accurate blaster fire took three of the ones remaining on his platform, another was picked up in one hand and promptly had its chest removed from its lower torso with nothing but bare hands. There went another, a simple blade spearing it through the face, the sheer strength of its owner driving it out the back of its head plating. Harry smiled at Sheowtulla's mother, recognising her from the assortment of beads that were tied into her head hair as he spied the rest of the family converging on him. The droids fell quickly. Oh, there was Jaina, pistol in had, watching her nail the last droid in the middle of its back as it scrambled down a tree, another grey one, he was rather glad he'd taken the precaution of inserting that compulsion when he had. He supposed he had better help clean things up, and maybe see if he could fix the trees whilst he was at it. With the droids gone, the entity had withdrawn, it was out there somewhere, drifting over the planet but until he had time, Harry could do little to attack it, he would have to put up with the feelings of terrible wrongness for a little while longer. That was when he staggered.

The power shunted as the timer reached zero, completing the process. Fluid bubbled as it drained from the large tank, its blue hue loosing its vibrancy as the form it had been suspending opened its eyes. The tank opened and the form was ejected from its containment. A droid, dusty from unuse activated and moved to the form. Spindly attachments folded out from its sides and it plunged them down into the form below it. Flesh tore under its strokes as fluids of all colours were injected into its prone form. A blade came down upon its spine and sliced, a pair of articulated forceps slowly inserted a dull red stone into the incision before applying a bacta patch to the cut, the form jerked but again fell still.

Above the facility a mind, tired from its exertions brutally and without any of its usual finesse ripped across the fabric of life and shoved whatever it could grab into the form idle below then let itself drift back to its body. Burnt orange and red eyes snapped open as Plagueis cradled his throbbing skull. Anger swirled, feeding the rage that pushed itself up his throat. Fear kept it down, fear of this being who had swatted him aside, time and time again. Nothing he had ever come across was like this one who called himself Harry. The fear gave way to anger and the rage climbed to a new height. Unable to contain himself any longer, Plagueis let loose with a force imbued scream that shook his refuge. He would not, could not be beaten in matters of the force. This was simply an avenue to explore, a new facet of life that he would grasp and dominate as he had all before. Regaining his composure, Plagueis allowed his mind to drift. With this Harry he could advance his understanding and mastery of the force. If the husk failed, despite his latent instruction and imbuement, then he would have to confront him directly, then, Harry would know, the fear that rightfully was due to the Sith. For now, he would wait and learn from the hunter teams data, even failure could hold lessons, and if the husk succeeded, then whatever was left would make a fine addition to his archives, after he was finished with them, of course. Outside of the stations sensor field, several cargo ships drifted in a slow circle, engines on idle, making only minor alterations to maintain position.

The husk clawed its way out of its prison, reinforced doors and earth proving no obstacle. It had one thought, destroy whatever had made it. It remembered pain, and the presence. It could feel a presence, so similar to that associated with the pain, pausing only long enough to decide on a direction it began a loping run. Rushing headlong through the forest floor it hunted, images, thoughts and instincts collided in its mind, driving it into an ever increasing frenzy of desperation. Destroy the presence was the only agreement it found within itself. Foam bubbled from its mouth as it clawed itself up a tree to hurl itself closer to the presence. Faster, get to the presence faster, destroy the presence faster. A last coherent thought echoed in its skull from outside its head as its minds melted under the deluge of contesting thoughts, devour him.

The Trandoshan begged before a blade of crimson separated its head from its shoulders. The wielder stepped over the body, seeking more prey. Exterminate them all, his master had told him. To go against the master meant death, to carry out his will, meant power. Hatred for the feeble scum bubbled within him, leashing it whilst feeding it as he had been taught, the figure clad in black moved deeper into the vessel. He enjoyed hunts like these, ghosting through the enemy before they realised, too late, that he was there. He did not enjoy the snivelling cretins who begged to be spared. Peace was a lie, as was mercy. Another of the scum, unaware, unprepared to meet death. The shadow smiled beneath his hood, quietly walking behind the Trandoshan as it sat, inhaling a deathstick, its last. The smile turned feral as his victim startled at the snap hiss of his lightsaber, crimson filled its vision as it was cleaved from head to toe and fell through the bench as it too had been cleaved. The shadow turned away frowning, he wasn't adept enough yet. He should have stopped before he cut the seat as well, stretching his senses outward, the smile came back, practice makes perfect after all.

 **Bitter Remembrance**

The world lurched and Harry staggered. Something was terribly wrong; it felt as if something had yanked all the air out of his lungs and frozen his heart. Clutching at his chest, Harry scanned his surroundings. The trees were still dead, the droids in various states of dismantlement, and the Wookies were cleaning up. Hovering over him and making frantic motions to the Wookies was Jaina, looking panicked. Harry shuddered as he found himself able to breath and greedily refilled his lungs. His heart hammered at his chest and his magic surged in a protective wave. Jaina was thrown several feet, borne aloft by a contrail of iridescent green as Harry fought his own panic down. He failed to catch her before she landed with a startled yelp and slammed head-first into the body of a droid. As Sheowtulla ran to where Jaina had landed, the Wookies turned to him and raised their weapons cautiously. Harry breathed deeply, centring himself and calming his fluctuating emotions. Sheowtulla growled a query at him, Jaina cradled in his arms. Raising a shield, Harry turned to his less physical senses. Anger, desperation, fear, grief, and blood-lust pulsed across his mind in a melee of emotion. Each seemed to vie for dominance with a need so strong he could taste bile in his mouth. Underscoring all of this, the tumult of approaching emotions was borne upon a cloud that felt like sludge as it drifted across his senses. It was almost akin to what a living being felt like, but incomplete and extremely twisted. He had felt something like it before, from when magic had not yet died. Searching his memory with the aid of occlumency, he found the answer. Opening his eyes, the Wookies backed away, careful to keep their weapons levelled as they abandoned the platform. Harry's vision took a red tinge as he clenched his fists. The platform shook as he let loose a growl of his own.

Sheowtulla was confused and upset. He had not meant to bring this danger upon his village, though he still could not think of anywhere safer. Harry, his friend, was in a dire situation, if the calibre of the droids sent after him were anything to go by. Though they had dealt with them easily enough, it had been strangely fortunate that the droids had not been fast enough to engage termination protocols beyond the sentries. Undoubtedly, this was due to Harry's influence. He was upset at the situation that he now found himself in. Officer Jaina had caught his attention,.She had been asking for help, standing next to a clearly distressed Harry, and he'd moved to assist. The shock-wave had struck unexpectedly, very nearly sweeping him off his feet. That the officer had been flung through the air with several energy trails around her body told him that Harry was responsible. He watched her land and winced, as her head-far more fragile than his own-smacked against a droid's chassis. Sheowtulla dove to her and picked her up, intent on getting her aid. He turned to the others, but stopped upon seeing what stood before him. Harry was clutching his chest, and his face was plastered into a snarl. Looking down at the unconscious woman, Sheowtulla couldn't help but raise the question: "Why?" He then took a sharp step back and slowly moved his passenger into a more shielded position as he caught sight of Harry's eyes. The subsequent growl and shaking of the platform had him edging toward the platform's end, towards the other villagers and away from Harry.

So close; it could taste what had to be its creator in the air. Correcting its direction for the next leap, the Husk paused as it smelt, then saw a twisted corpse lying on the forest floor. Something close to familiarity resonated in its mind as several discordant thoughts, feelings, and images crashed against its purpose. Rage, sorrow, and fear all burned in its psyche. Shaking itself, ragged fur bristled whilst muscle bulged as it again flung its bulk from tree to tree. Blood-flecked foam dripped from serrated teeth-equal parts metal and bone-as it heaved itself up towards the canopy. Crazed eyes swivelled wildly in their sockets as it sought its prey. The trees were shaking as if a great wind was buffeting them. Adjusting its clawed grips, the Husk easily compensated for the motion and again leapt. This time, however, it landed awkwardly, causing it to scrabble and bite the wood for purchase. Within its heavily altered body, a thin membrane along its spine was punctured by a metal spike that lay across its vertebrae, allowing the cocktail of its blood to interact with the implanted stone. Its eyes bulged and it let loose a scream as agony turned into fire that boiled through its veins. Upwards it scrambled, tearing great chunks from the tree as it did so. The creator was here, it had to be. This thought cascaded through its mind as it burst through the canopy. Screams issued from more than a dozen mouths heralded its arrival but it did not care. It only had eyes for the one in the middle of the circular construct. The Husk only saw one person before it, death was wreathed within the gaze that surveyed, this, this was the creator. Rage descended as madness returned to its mind, the creator must die.


	4. Chapter 4

Hello again readers, Tarrus here.

Firstly a big thankyou to Kaffinee for your continuing help with my english. It is greatly appreciated.

Thankyou to all who take the time to review, your comments/ideas have altered the storyline several times already and helped me fix mistakes. Please continue to do so.

The most obvious impact you've had is to advance the speed with which we get to the events of the movies.

To those who flame, I can't do much to improve if all you tell me is that you don't like what you have read.

Apologies for the long wait between chapters, I try to write at least a few thousands words a week minimum but even then I struggle so I ask that you bear with me.

Enough from me, please enjoy.

Stirring the Pot Chapter 4

 **Memory**

2025 - Earth, Prague Castle-Czech Republic

The man on stage was not what Harry had expected. He was a short, balding man who kept fidgeting with his hands even as he addressed the assembled crowd of masked witches and wizards that Harry was also within. His voice, even aided by a Sonorous, was not one he would describe as belonging to a man of stature in any grouping. He occupied a simple stage, bare of anything but a long wooden box and a sheet-covered object behind him. Despite his apparent lack of discernible authority, here, in this 'conference', everybody listened with rapt attention.

"My lords, ladies, distinguished guests, fellow travellers of the Path. I have gathered you here today to discuss the advancement of our particular brand of magic, so foolishly shunned by our society."

Murmurs from the crowd, overwhelmingly in agreement, made Harry fight the urge to start casting, he was here to gather intelligence for the ICW, not to start a fight. The speaker upon the stage cleared his throat and continued:

"As many of you know, I have dedicated a number of years to the study of alchemy, particularly its applications towards empowering those guardians so many of us use - and which I have supplied so many of to you. I am of course, referring to the creation and utilisation of inferi. It is with great pleasure that I can reveal to you the driving force behind my studies. Please accord him all the respect due to his achievements. However, I will first point out that he is sitting within a negation matrix, so to the more bold of you, don't try anything."

Stepping back, the man grasped the sheet and pulled, revealing a simple-straight backed wooden chair that held a hunched figure chained into a seated position. The speaker reached under the figure's chin and lifted it so that the extremely well-known face, bruised and bloodied that it was, caught the light from the chandelier above.

"My friends, allow me to present Nicholas Flamel."

Harry clamped his hands on the sides of his own chair to resist the urge to leap up and attack as the stunned silence broke into a standing ovation. The speaker bowed to the audience and let go of Flamel's chin, allowing his head to drop back to his chest. The audience eventually subsided and retook their seats. Moving to the long box, the speaker continued:

"Mister Flamel has been instrumental in the assistance that he has rendered me into completing this project. Whilst I regrettably have not yet been able to create a philosopher's stone of my own, with his guidance, I have forged a catalyst that will usher in a new level of security, strength, and power for us devotees of the Path."

The sigh of disappointment from the audience turned back into keen interest as the speaker aimed his wand down at the box and with it started tracing lazy circles in the air as he recommenced speaking:

"The main flaw of the inferi has always been that they are puppets, only capable of the most basic levels of autonomy and constantly requiring direction to maximise their potential. Secondary to this is their aversion to fire and propensity to degrade over time. I theorised that this was due to the relatively simple death magic that maintains them. Thus, I wondered - - what if a stable source of magic, one inherently tied to the maintaining of life, was used to counterbalance that of the death magic that powers them yet also erodes them? The result, my friends, I show to you now. Allow me to present the first of a new type of inferius, the Husk, which you will no doubt recognise as the late Perenelle Flamel."

With a flourish of his wand, the crates lid slid free from its resting place. With a jerk, a greyed hand with long, uneven fingernails grasped the side, which promptly splintered. Harry could only stare as the, _thing- -_ once one of the most respected women in the magical world - - rose from the crate. Eyes sunken and black against the heavily scarred tissue that surrounded its face, tiny pinpricks of red light shone from fresh lacerations along its exposed arms. Nicholas Flamel, Harry saw, was also staring, eyes open despite the bruising and weeping. Throughout this, the speaker continued:

"You will note that it possesses the same strength and indifference to pain as that of a regular inferius, something I am endeavouring to improve upon with my efforts regarding to the stone. Thus far, in the three years since its imbuement, the Husk has demonstrated no decay, no aversion to fire, a resistance to direct magic such as curses and hexes-of which I have demonstrated by using the Lacero curse upon its arms-beyond its less sophisticated counterparts, and even a rudimentary regenerative ability, indicated by the red glow It has also demonstrated a remarkable capacity toward operating faithfully under orders at considerable distance from the controller, under both direct control and without supervision. I would note however that while its behaviour is pleasingly single-minded in the pursuit of its orders, it will cease to function upon their completion. Those of you from Hungary will remember the circumstances of the slaughtered village last June."

The Husk, stood there, oblivious to anything and everything. Flamel had shut his eyes and his mouth was moving, repeating something to himself. The speaker continued, the audience hanging on to his every word, several where even taking notes Harry fumbled for his emergency beacon, he needed to do something, and he needed backup. _Now_. Just as he pressed down on the coin that housed the beacon, the speaker paused and looked across the audience. His eyes met Harry's, and he smiled.

"Before I continue onto the bidding, I have just realised that I have been remiss in welcoming a singularly distinguished guest."

The speaker swept his arm and wand up, pointing directly at Harry as he raised the deathstick in return. his pale knuckled hand aiming the elder wand directly between the speakers eyes. Confused rumblings from the audience filled the space as thuds from blocked apparitions could be heard from outside the walls.

"Welcome to this conference of the Path of Death. I am so pleased that you could make it, Harry Potter, lead ICW hit wizard - - and more importantly, Master of Death."

 **Proof of Magic**

Kashyyk, Sheowtulla's village

Harry was angry. No, not angry- he had passed angry the moment he had realised just what he was staring at. Somehow, the followers of the Path had survived. He had thought they'd been annihilated; he had personally seen to it that every scrap of research he could lay his hands on had met with a fiery demise, along with anyone who had used it. Harry slowly raised both of his hands and thrust them forward. Rage crawled from behind his mind shields and found freedom in the bellowed spell:

" **REDUCTO!"**

The husk, mid charge, took the spell to the chest and promptly exploded. Bone, blood and metal rained down around Harry and tumbled to the forest floor. The concussive wave shook the platform and Harry swayed as the supports struggled to cope. Harry stood there and waited out the swaying. Wookies were shouting at him from the surrounding platforms, clearly distressed at the damage he may have done. But Harry only had eyes for the smoking lower torso across from him, willing himself to be wrong, even as his eyes told him otherwise.

Harry could see the stone, lodged in what was left of the Husk's body. Its red glow flaring as bone and flesh grew around it. How had the knowledge survived? Who was able to even use it since magic faded? These questions burned at Harry's mind even as the half-grown grotesque monster started to claw its way towards him again. Harry watched as the husk repaired itself. This was different to those he had destroyed so long ago; its regenerative ability was far more advanced, as was its durability. Harry frowned. He could feel the souls streaming back into the ether, and the resurrection stone on his finger was resonating against the screams in his mind, too fast for him to identify individuals. That shouldn't be possible; only he had the capacity to manipulate souls directly. The stone pulsed, and the souls stopped coming.

Swiping a hand up and across, even as the Husk's head took form from bubbling tissue, Harry began his onslaught. The platform trembled as wooden hands grasped from below, and the air shivered as Harry conjured a block of granite upon its head. The husk was torn, crushed and ripped as Harry sought the stone that powered it. For five minutes, Harry repeated the process, pulverising anything that formed. For five minutes, the Wookies and a semi-conscious Jaina watched as Harry made bloody soup out of the thing that had come crashing through the trees. For five minutes, Yoda's droid recorded the whole event and sent it on to the temple, and for five minutes, souls screamed in Harry's mind as he sought to free them and end the abomination before him.

Finally, it stopped reforming. With one last shudder, the last remnant-a partially formed arm-fell limp into the pool of blood that dripped over the platform's edge. One last whimper in his mind bore the passing of the soul of a child. Harry strode forward, and with a flick of his wrist and a thin beam of light, he tore the arm in half. Reaching down, Harry plucked the stone, now a dark black with cracks running throughout it, from the wreckage. It still glowed, feeble wisps of red leaking from the cracks. Clenching his fist, the stone shattered, and he hurled the fragments over the edge. Harry took a deep breath and looked to the sky whilst the blood and bone beneath his feet turned to ash. Trying to find a trace of the entity that had assailed his mind before.

Somewhere out there, someone had used a form of Magic- Magic that Harry had personally tried to eradicate from history and somehow had dragged the deceased back across the threshold of death. Looking down at the rapidly disappearing remains, Harry wondered. Just what else may have survived the passing of time, and who else out there was able to use it? Turning to his silent audience, Harry's eyes sought out the wide eyes of Jaina. A small trickle of dried blood had drifted down across her face and her eyes held an emotion Harry was all too familiar with: fear. Dismissing these thoughts, Harry began summoning the destroyed droids. Harry had a witch or wizard to locate. He had questions for this follower of the path. He was sure of one thing, he wouldn't be finding them on this planet, and he would need all the eyes and ears he could muster if he was to search the stars.

 **Chasing Shadows**

Yoda watched as the republic security forces docked on the drifting slave ship. He knew it was devoid of life even without looking at the sensor readouts that indicated the atmosphere had been vented. Whoever had sent them in the first place was still one step ahead of him. To be able to intercept and silence an entire vessel of trandoshans without any evidence of a space battle was worrying and indicated influence beyond what he would expect from any power outside of the Jedi themselves.

That was not the only problem. Yoda had left Kashyyk on the understanding that a suitable Jedi escort had been dispatched to escort the anomaly, Harry, to the temple on Coruscant. His last communication from the temple had indeed been an affirmation of his request, but rather than acknowledging his original request, they had instead affirmed the cancellation of said order. Yoda needed to get back to the temple and start investigating, return to Kashyyk and ensure that Harry did not fall into the wrong hands, assign someone to the growing rumblings from the banking clans, keep a watch over the upcoming senate elections, and so many other things.

Breaking from his reverie, Yoda turned his attention to the incoming feeds from the security teams. The holo displays all held similar images. Dead trandoshans, in varying states of dismemberment many with injuries that only a lightsaber could have inflicted. In the zero gravity, the corpses were drifting. Some of the security force had thrown up at the site- not a pleasant prospect, considering the enviro suits they were wearing and the images being sent back were disquieting enough without the audio.

Turning from the displays, there was at least something he could do now in this shadow game. Yoda made his way to the communication array, in-putted the code for the temple, inserted his communicator and engaged its highest encryption. Two people had access to this code, and only one of them was in residence at the temple.

The blue projector flickered as Yoda established contact. A dark skinned, bald human in robes appeared, seated in a deep chair.

"Master Yoda, I was not expecting you to contact me, much less on the emergency code."

Yoda inclined his head in greeting and responded:

"Master Windu, grave news I bring you. Compromised our communications is, trust normal channels I do not. Ask you to investigate, I do."

Windu leant forward, concern now prominent across his face and delivered a rapid series of questions:

"Compromised? Do you know how? Does this have anything to do with the disturbances on Kashyyk? Of which everyone is expecting an update on."

Shaking his head, Yoda thought about the events of the last few days. Everything pointed to an outside force. The anomaly, Harry, he was sure, did not possess the means, or even the understanding, to do such a thing. It would serve nothing to direct any investigation there. He would pass his thoughts on to the council on his return. That would give him more time:

"Presence of dark Jedi on Kashyyk, there was. Forced to flee, he was. Anomaly contained to planet, investigating still, I am. Last communication to temple intercepted, orders changed, they were. Request investigation, I do, covert it must be."

Windu leant back on his chair and adjusted his robes.

"I will begin immediately. Master Plo Koon can take over the sabre training of the younglings for a few days. I expect you will send me the transmission logs?"

Yoda nodded his agreement, and ended the transmission with a sincere,

"May the force be with you."

To which Windu returned with the traditional,

"And also with you."

As the holodisplay flickered out, Yoda activated his hover chair and sat onto it as it rose from the floor. The bodies were being transported over from the dead ship, he would learn what he could. Then he would go back to Kashyyk. Apprehension swirled in Yoda's mind at the thought of returning to Kashyyk, his normal feelings of affection for the planet having been displaced by a growing sense of unease. He was sure whatever Harry had been up to would only cause more problems that would be difficult to keep from the attention of the greater galaxy, even with the blanket holo news ban he'd instructed the Wookies to implement still in effect.

 **Mr. Fixit**

Jaina contemplated making a run for it. Her 'charge', Harry, was talking to Yoda's droid again, and Sheowtulla and the rest of the Wookies were trying to fix the damaged speeders. She had to get back and report to command; the droid had refused to give her access to its communicator. The village relay had been destroyed by the droids. She needed help- preferably jedi help- though she would settle for the security teams at headquarters. Fortunately, some of the villagers were currently keeping an eye on Harry. Their blasters were off, but not holstered. They at least would, hopefully, be able to stun him if he tried to leave whilst she sought help from the next village. Shaking her head, Jaina turned her attention to the pile where Harry had deposited the droids. With any luck, one of them may have an intact memory bank with evidence to back up a story that was going to sound like she was on spice.

Sheowtulla was both thankful to and scared of Harry. The powers which Harry had used to dispose of the creature had frightened him and the whole village: causing dead wood to grow hands, blasting something apart with a single hand gesture, and calmly using a rock that hadn't existed previously to bludgeon something into a paste. Those powers had rattled them all and sparked Sheowtulla's own curiosity at the same time. Sheowtulla had convinced the village chief to host the little group after relaying the events at the capitol. He had thought himself further justified in offering Harry sanctuary after he had seen Harry crush a droid's faceplate with his bare hands, just like a Wookie. Sheowtulla would willingly admit that the creature, unlike anything Sheowtulla had ever seen before, much less hunted, had spooked him. But what really had him concerned was the rage with which Harry had blasted the thing apart with. Sheowtulla owed Harry; he would try and help him, and with any luck, he would get to see more of whatever it was that Harry could do. Taking a hydro-spanner from his father, Shoewtulla turned back to the wreck of a speeder before him. One thing was for certain: Harry was no Jedi.

Harry, oblivious to the scrutiny, was focused on the droid and was trying to come to grips with the language. So far he'd managed to say hello, my name is, and the words for ship, fly, money, food, toilet and passage. He needed to get back to the capitol, and then up into space. From there, he'd try and reacquire the trace of the entity that had attacked him. It was unfortunate, but he would not be able to search this planet for anything that may have survived until this was taken care of. Giving up on learning any more, Harry turned from the droid and surveyed the wrecked transports. Himself, the droid, Sheowtulla and Jaina- he needed capacity for four. Aware of the two rather large Wookies standing not far away from him and cradling an equally intimidating gun each, Harry slowly raised his hand towards the pile of wreckage. He stopped when the Wookies promptly levelled their guns at him. He then lowered his hand far more slowly than when he had raised it in response to the rather large blade poking him in the back. Careful not to make any sudden movements, Harry tilted his head back and looked behind him. Sheowtulla's mother was towering above him, and in her hand was the blade he had last seen sheering through metal. In a level voice, Harry called the droid over and asked it to translate.

"I am going to try and fix the transports. Please assure her and the others that I mean no harm."

The droid relayed the message, and after some intense staring, she took the blade away and growled back at the droid. The droid made an affirmative noise and turned back to him:

"She warns you not to try anything, and that if you cause any more damage, she will rip your head of with her bare hands."

Sheowtulla's mother growled at the repair crews and they promptly moved away without hesitation. The droid dutifully translated to Harry.

"She has told them you're about to use your power to fix the vehicles. She has also told them that she has you covered if anything goes wrong."

Harry sighed at the last part before looking back at his custodian, who nodded at him. Slowly, and with as much control as Harry could manage, he willed the damage to be undone. Gently, the largest pieces of wreckage drifted into the air and glowed a pale green. Scorch marks and small rips in the metal disappeared as the glow intensified. Expanding his area of focus and increasing the power behind the spell, the rest of the wreckage also drifted up into the air. Green light shone through the pieces and vanished as the debris began to swirl in a lazy spiral, pieces slotting back into place and rejoining. A grey Wookie dropped his cutting torch, eyes wide in amazement as a piece of metal the size of his head uncrumpled, flew through the air, and gently socketed itself into the front of the speeder he had been trying to salvage. The light intensified as wiring pulled itself through holes and fused back together as ripped edges smoothed themselves out. One by one the glow subsided as Harry gently laid the vehicles to rest. Looking over the faces now turned toward him, Harry became aware that he was receiving something he disliked almost as much as fear: awe. The spell was, to Harry's relief, promptly broken when Sheowtulla's mother dumped a pile of broken electronics at his feet. This signalled the start of a stampede as everything broken in the village was laid infront of him. Wistfully eyeing the repaired transports, Harry got on with his new task.

 **Advancing Schedule**

Senator Sheev Palpatine bowed low to the new Queen, a friendly smile plastered on his face. Protocol demanded nothing less and whilst he would prefer a rather different set of actions, the persona was still valuable. The young teenaged Amidala had just seen fit to inform him that he was being retained as senator. Straightening and biting back a new wave of frustration, he sought to finish today's façade:

"Thank you, your Majesty, for this opportunity to continue to serve the people of Naboo. I again request leave to travel to Coruscant; things are well in hand here."

Much to his consternation, the security chief, Panaka, lent down and whispered something in the child's ear. His ship was already prepared for take-off and the contingency had been enacted. All that was left was to get off the planet. Action was required now, patience was for the long game, not the ending moments of the last. Finally, Panaka stopped his whispering and went back to his position. The child then addressed him:

"Senator, I agree with the need for you to return to Coruscant. But first, I would like to discuss the Gungan situation with you."

Palpatine nearly growled at this new annoyance. If he could have his way, he would leave the planet's natives to their own devices, they posed no threat, even to Naboo's pathetic limited military. Much less to the plans he had for his home planet, indeed they may be essential precisely as they were.

"Your Highness, we discussed this before your inauguration. The Gungans are a primitive species; they make their living in the swamps, not interacting at all with our government. As such, I counsel patience until they seek to initiate diplomacy."

The child seemed reassured by that, if the gesture to leave was any indication. Palpatine took the opportunity, departing with as much speed as decorum allowed. He still had time to make it back to Coruscant for the new round of elections, even with his planned detour. Finally, he could start the opening acts of his ascendancy, at least after the closing act of his own apprenticeship and servitude.

Reaching the hangar, a pleasing thought occurred to him. If the Jedi stayed true to their usual ineffective methods, he might even have time to acquire the being from Kashyyk, this Harry Potter. After all, things that could not apparently be killed could still be contained until a means of disposal could be found.

 **Flying Lesson**

Jaina was proving to be a font of information for Harry. He had tried to get Sheowtulla to show him how to operate the speeder he was currently sitting on. Unfortunately, even with the droid's help, it was proving difficult. Jaina had come to the rescue with hand gestures. The toggle on the right meant forward, so accelerate, the protruding bars on the handles meant back or stop, so brakes and so on the lesson went. Once she had shown him the off switch, Harry lost interest in the lesson. Rubbing his hands together, Harry took hold of the handles and turned what he thought was the on knob. He promptly froze when the speeder came to life under him and rose into the air. Jaina must have seen the grin that came over his face as she started shaking her head at him and yelling. Harry did not need the droid to translate that she was telling him to stop. It also did not stop him from hitting the accelerator. With a roar of the engine and laughter, Harry shot of between the trees.

Swearing in Basic, Huttese and even some Wookie, Jaina vaulted the next speeder, yelled at the Wookies to make way, gunned the engine and gave chase.

Harry had very nearly forgotten what it felt like to fly, to have nothing beneath him but air. The freedom, the joy, it all came back to him. This was his element, trees blurred past him as he continued to accelerate. He dove under branches, swerved around trees and let himself get lost in the feeling, the world turning into a green and brown blur. A large tree was directly in front of him and above there was a gap in the canopy. His grin widened as he put more pressure on the accelerator and hurtled towards it. Yanking back the handles, he entered a steep climb brushing the trunk of the tree, aiming for the canopy. He wanted to see the sky, maybe even fly in a cloud. Grin still firmly in place, Harry broke through the canopy.

Jaina was skirting the top of the trees. The speeder was starting to struggle with the altitude. The only reason it was able to reach this height was that it had been adapted by the Wookies and the canopy was currently thick enough. Repulsor vehicles required something to repulse against, after all, to achieve lift. Harry was travelling at speed, if her pinger-another Wookie addition to prevent getting lost in the forest-was accurate. It was getting louder as she closed in on him. Once she found him and got him back to the village, she would get Sheowtulla to sit on him whilst they travelled back to the capitol. Enough time must have passed by now for Yoda to at least be on his way back, if not for the official escort to have arrived. She could hear the speeder now, slightly to her right. Adjusting her direction, her eyes widened as Harry burst through the canopy less than two metres in front of her. He was travelling straight up. Jaina's eyes widened more as she realised what he was trying to do. Swerving the speeder, around she completed the turn, the rear of her speeder dipping dangerously low into he foliage beneath her. Jaina stabilised and looked up just as Harry's speeder peaked. The confusion on Harry's face was the last thing she saw before he started to descend.

Sheowtulla was surprised that Harry and Jaina had returned a good hour after Harry's flight. They had coasted slowly back to the landing pad. Jaina had tied the two speeders together and led the way back. Sheowtulla had expected Harry to crash straight after take-off. Though the limp Harry was trying to hide and the dirt smeared across his face, coupled with the disgruntled expression on Jaina's face and the way she was holding her arm, indicated that some sort of accident had happened. Resolving to ask what had happened after Jaina had her arm looked at, Sheowtulla finished stowing the droid on the transport and moved over to them. Yoda had sent through a personal message that they were to return to the capitol.

 **Decisions**

It was with a difficult application of discipline that prevented Yoda from applying a mind trick as Commander Chertin regaled him with a veritable flood of platitudes mixed with apologies. Truly the man had a gift for inducing headaches, and not simply due to his ineptitude. Chertin had been talking non-stop the whole way from the landing platform, where the unloading of the trandoashan remains was still taking place, to the Republic Security Office were Yoda was now reviewing the security logs. Out of politeness rather than interest, Yoda briefly tuned back into Chertins diatribe:

"I want to further point out that all matters of force use are not in my jurisdiction, and under the circumstances wish to make you aware that I did everything in my power to prevent the subjects' exit. Furthermore, whilst I have the greatest of admiration and respect for your exalted position, I have no choice but to register a formal complaint as to the absence of sufficient resources at my disposal. Not that I am indicating any such fault on your part though..."

Shaking his head, at least internally, Yoda studied the captured footage. No simple illusion could fool the sensors in such a detailed manner, and there was no evidence of the recording having been tampered with. The gap in the Commander's memory, his waking up in a chair to find a transport missing, and all the apparent physical changes to the Commanders face –now missing- told a compelling story. One backed up by the near tangible threads of force that haloed Chertin's head. Harry, it seemed possessed, power beyond anything but the most revered, or loathed, of force users had ever come close to achieving. Turning to address the Commander directly, Yoda outlined his orders, lacing his words with a touch of the force, simply in order to speed Chertin on his way and in no way intended to make sure he was heard over Chertin's continuing appeals:

"Harry Potter, arriving within the hour, he will be. Arrange a security escort, you will. Disturb me until the party arrives, you will not."

As Chertin scurried off, Yoda turned back to the screens. Abilities such as these were very close to approaching the realms of myth, and if the wielder of these was not a grown man, perhaps prophecy. There were four options that came to Yoda's mind. Incorporate Harry Potter into the Jedi- - difficult, but from his aid to the Wookies, perhaps not impossible. Refrain from risking the potential catastrophe of someone with so much power remaining unchecked - again this would prove difficult, but it would not be an insurmountable task; it had already been proven that he could be rendered unconscious. Make him known to the senate directly and allow them input- this was the most unpredictable option, and with the breaches in Jedi security, not a pleasing prospect. Finally, Yoda could attempt to extend a first contact program- no doubt already underway, if his droid's reports were true, and he was hesitant to act in an aggressive manner.

Yoda was broken from his contemplations as his droid sent a position update to his communicator, quickly followed by an encrypted message from the temple relayed from his ship. Listening to the message, Yoda turned to the holo display. Yoda again watched as Harry altered Chertin's face, then as an obvious response to Officer Jaina's distress, Harry waved his hand over the alterations as if they had been made with oil, they rippled and vanished. If anything was obvious in this moment, Harry Potter must be kept away from unsavoury interests, and if the Jedi had the ability to ensure this, that was not a question Yoda felt comfortable answering.

 **Breach**

Sheev Palpatine assumed his black robes and the mantle of Darth Sidous as his heavily modified Scimitar, reclassified as the Sith infiltrator, exited hyperspace. Sidous could immediately tell that his timing could not have been better; the miasma that normally eclipsed his senses around the gently idling space station before him was a fraction of its normal strength. The force, it seemed, was with him. Fingers dancing over the flight console, Sidous engaged the activation sequence to the five cargo ships that had been idling at the outermost sensor range. Almost immediately after the transmission was sent, the station came to life. Active scanners swept the area, his flight computer sending unnecessary alarms as they identified his presence. He could see the formidable laser batteries, turning towards him as the station rotated, no doubt powering up as they were attended to by utility droids. It was with deep satisfaction that he watched the first of the cargo ships reappear from its forced emergency micro jump directly between his ship and the station just as the batteries opened fire.

Carefully manoeuvring his craft so as not to engage the close-range targeting protocols, Sidous watched as the other four ships reappeared around the station and gunned their engines on a collision course. Closely following the ship to his left, Sidous flared his own engines and lined up a run on the hangar, just as the cargo ships made contact. The reactive pane that screened the cockpit dimmed as the flares erupted from the contact points. Corona's, of blue and yellow flame, continued to be expelled into space as the cargo ships unloaded their contents. Idly, Sidous noted that the laser battery had stopped firing and that the station was no longer rotating in order to track him. Hangar in site, Sidous fired the single ion torpedo from the ship's belly and watched as it sailed straight into the hangar's shielding apparatus. Obeying the urge to act, he activated his boosters even as the shield died and the blast door began to close. With seconds to spare, his ship made it into the hangar, sparks screeching as it slid to a stop.

Wasting no time, Sidous unclipped his lightsaber and popped the cockpit, vaulting over the side igniting his saber as he went. With surprise, Sidous noted the hangar was virtually empty. A single transport ship lay at rest to the rear of the hangar. He had expected security droids, or perhaps even some of his master's failed experiments to meet him. However, nothing but bare metal and the distant sound of alarms and explosions reached him. Even his force sense registered nothing- it was as if his master had sucked everything into himself and hidden. A smile broke across his face. If his master was hiding, then he was vulnerable. Leaping into the air, Sidous brought his saber down upon the reinforced door he knew would take him on the most direct path to the master's sanctum, or more precisely the non-reinforced wall next to it.

Nothing, still nothing. Sidous had been cautiously making his way along the corridors and had not come across a single droid. His footsteps were nearly painfully loud as they echoed on the bare metal floors. The collisions of the cargo ships had taken out the primary shield array and the communications tower and inserted a sizable force of his own battle droids, gratefully provided by the trade federation for a trifling business deal, and of course altered to better suit his needs. The explosions and alarms had stopped. His droids would be sweeping the lower decks, eliminating the hunter droids in storage and delivering his countermeasure to his master's playthings simultaneously. He had to be the one to kill his master if he was to ascend as master. Resisting the urge to look up at the sensors that were no doubt following his every move, Sidous kept moving.

Sidous resisted the creeping paranoia as he continued down the labyrinth of corridors. He knew the purpose of this maze, how it was meant to aid his master's ability to induce both anxiety and uncertainty. Idly. he ran a hand up the side of his torso, feeling the reassuring shape of the package he was carrying as it rested over flesh that had not so long ago been rendered to the bone. A left turn, another left, past the primary generator room and through his old saber training room. The uniform grey of the corridors and rooms, broken up only by whatever apparatus they housed, finally gave way to a set of large black and dark red doors, directly taken from the temples of Korriban along with the two unlit braziers. Pausing, Sidous braced himself to pay the toll and took out a short blade from its sheath on his waist. The time of Darth Plagueis would end today.


	5. Chapter 5

Stirring the Pot Chapter 5

 **Complication**

The first thing that told Harry that they were getting close to the city was that the trees were starting to thin. The green blanket beneath them was giving way, punctuated by black holes. The second thing, was that Jaina had engaged the communicator and was having a rather hurried conversation. The words 'droid', 'Jedi', 'Wookie' and 'damage' were all that Harry could pick out from the conversation. Whatever was being said, the general impression, mirrored by a rather uncomfortable looking Sheowtulla who was controlling the transport, was one that inspired a degree of wariness in him. That the translator droid was again stuck to the rear of the transport- along with all of the other droids that Harry had been able to miniaturise without arousing suspicion- meant he could not check what was going on.

As the ride progressed, the increasing nervousness became readily apparent. As the city itself came into view, Harry discreetly channelled his magic, layering it into a shield against his skin. It was only when the transport started to slow down and they were joined by an unmistakably military craft that Harry seriously considered apparition. As they approached the landing platform, however, Harry resisted the urge. Down on the platform, a delegation of Wookies-backed up by a sizable contingent of armed fellows- was arguing with another large contingent of varying beings all in Jaina's uniform. Several of the Wookies had taken up a circle around the centre of the platform. Looking across to the entry ramp, Harry spotted Yoda, whose eyes were tracking the transport as it descended.

Touchdown was done slowly and gently with their airborne escort retreating as soon as they landed. As Harry exited the vehicle, he was greeted by an enthusiastic roar from a Wookie that towered even over Sheowtulla. Blinking up at the hairy being he, was forced to consider whether Sheowtulla was an adolescent. As his eyes traced the ornamental apparel, it was obvious this Wookie was a dignitary. Rough scraping and muffled growls caught his attention as the translator droid walked up to them, its attention solely on the new Wookie as he began growling:

"King Grakchawwaa welcomes you back to Rwookrroro. He wishes to make his gratitude as to your actions defending the city against the trandoshan menace known. He also names you friend of all Wookies, as voted by the ruling council of families. As such, you are now considered a citizen of this planet, and all the rights and protections that entails. ."

Here the droid paused as the King gave it a very pointed look and a short growl. Once he finished, the droid turned back to Harry:

"The king wishes me to place extra emphasis on the affording of protection for yourself."

Harry was shocked at this. He gave a short bow, stammering out a reply:

"Tell King Grakchawwaa that I am honoured by his, and the family council's decision."

Harry was about to enquire what was really meant by the word protection, but was cut off as the sound of raised voices, accompanied by a gentle gust of air that Harry recognised as coming from Yoda, reached him.

 **Frustration**

The ominous double doors had flared after Sidous smeared his own fresh drawn blood against them, also igniting the braziers into pale blue smokeless flames. Waiting, Sidous was rewarded when the doors swung inwards. He had never discovered whether the doors could be used to lock someone out after they had been keyed in, and neither, apparently, had his master. Striding into the hall before him, Sidous was on high alert. In here, he did not know the layout- or at least not beyond the hall he currently occupied. He had been declared a Darth here, kneeling before several relics from the Old Empire- relics that were now absent. Suspicion mounting, Sidous ventured to the end of the hall.

The hall was a reflection of those found in the underground chambers of the Temple of Sacrifice, an ancient Sith temple located on Yavin 4. The site had been part of his early training. Devoid of even the most trivial artefacts, its representation here continued to spark his curiosity. Pushing those thoughts to the side, Sidous made himself focus and reached out with the force. His senses pierced the metal structure around him in an expanding cloud. Concentrating, Sidous increased his intensity. Even the few- including his master- that could normally cloak themselves from force sight left a shadow in the face of a concentrated field of force, it was simply a matter of suffusing an area with so much force that the hidden became notable by the hole they left in the field.

All that met him were residual feelings; frustration, pain, intoxicating darkness... and underscoring all of this was the queerness of life and death that permeated Darth Plagueis's presence. Nothing else, even the dim presence of sealed Sith artefacts, was absent. They had been moved. Realisation dawned in Sidous's mind: Plagueis had left. Frustration and anger swirled within his mind. Frustration that he had missed his best chance, anger at himself for not considering- much less realising- such an obvious contingency, and fear. Fear of what a Darth Plaguies, loose in the galaxy, could do to interfere with his plans. A sharp pain tore unexpectedly across the cut he had made across his hand as his force sense went haywire.

Cradling his now inflamed hand, Sidous whipped around to face the double doors. A force presence unlike anything he had felt before was manifesting; he could feel it feeding from his blood. For a moment, it had seemed that Plagueis had appeared from nothing. Pale blue flame, pouring from the braziers, was creeping along the floor through the open doors. It rose in slow tendrils, the flame disappearing as it reached the ceiling Which left a silvery blue vapour streaked with undulating chords of black hanging in the air obscuring the exit. Behind it, the braziers sputtered and died, leaving only darkness beyond as the corridors light failed. It was then a low grinding noise reached Sidous. The façade from the Sith temple that lined the room was shaking and cracking, and the walls were moving, closing in on him. Masonry fell from the walls and ceiling as they began to advance towards him. Dodging, Sidous evaded a falling lamp that had been suspended on the ceiling.

Sidous had only one exit, but that lay through whatever trap Plagueis had set. The cloud of silvery gas was between him and freedom. Reaching for the force, Sidous pushed at the gas. It rippled, but remained in place. Mindful of the rapidly approaching walls, he pushed harder. A small tendril of black chord shifted towards the doors, then settled back into the cloud. As the last of the fake ceiling came down around him, Sidous suffused his body with the force, took a deep breath and leapt with all of his strength- through the cloud of vapour.

 **Friend Harry**

Harry was listening to the droid intently as the conversation played out in front of him, eager to know why he warranted the 'protection' and just what it meant. Yoda was trying to state his case, and from the sound of it, seemed to be somewhat rushed:

"King Grakchawwaa, understand your position, I do. But insist upon custody of this young man, I must."

Grakchawwaa growled in return. The droid continued its narration:

"He has been granted citizen rights; you do not have jurisdiction to take him."

That sentence caused Harry's interest and caution to spike. Interjecting, he got the droid to enter his own question into the conversation:

"Take me where?"

Both Grakchawwaa and Yoda turned to him and spoke. The droid's response confirmed Harry's misgivings:

"Master Yoda wishes to transport you to the temple on Coruscant. There, he will have you evaluated whilst educating you on functioning in the galaxy and make sure you are not prosecuted by Republic Security Commander Chertin. King Grakchawwaa insists that he will not allow you to be removed from the planet against your will or allow anyone to treat you as a criminal. He also states that any education you need can be taken care of here."

Contemplating this in contrast to his own desire to find the source of the Husk and knowing that this was probably highly political, Harry turned to address the King, fully aware of the close scrutiny of both:

"King Grakchawwaa, I again thankyou for the honour that has been bestowed upon me. However in light of the attack upon myself, of which you are no doubt aware-"

Here, Harry paused and shot a look toward Sheowtulla, who was fidgeting with a hose attached to the speeder. Jaina was beside him, looking as if she wanted to be anywhere else but here. Then Harry continued:

"-I cannot in good conscience bring any more trouble to your planet."

Before Grakchawwaa had time to interject, Harry turned his attention to Yoda:

"Jedi Master Yoda, I have no intention to be taken to this temple of yours for evaluation. Nor do I intend to surrender myself to your security forces. As for the issue of my education, I am certain that, with adequate companions, I will be able."

The resultant and quickly smothered fluctuation in the breeze was the only outward indication to Harry that he had caused Yoda any irritation with this statement. It was also prevented from being noticed by others due to the outburst from Grakchawwaa, the droid struggling to catch up to the rapid-fire roars and growls relayed for Harry:

"You do not mean to leave Kashyyk before we can thank you properly? I can understand you not wanting to go to Coruscant, but surely you will stay for a short time?"

It took several minutes but Harry was able to reach a compromise: he would stay at least for a few days and meet with the other Wookie rulers before he brought up leaving the planet again. In the meantime and for the foreseeable future, Yoda had graciously allowed him the use of his droid for the purposes of learning the language in exchange for a controlled demonstration of magic. Harry left them as they together went and addressed the Security force that Harry now saw was being led by the purple face of the Officer he had sent to sleep. Flicking a dampening charm at the man, Harry fought down his amusement as- Chertins that was his name- voice became lost in the other noises around the platform. Yoda, it seemed had caught what he had done, if the stare he was receiving from the short being was any indication. Harry narrowed his eyes as Yoda tapped Grakchawwaa on the arm, and after waiting for the tall Wookie to bend down, whispered in his ear and gestured at him. The Wookie nodded and straightened. He made a movement with his hand, and Harry suddenly found himself with an entourage. The Wookies that had encircled the transport were now encircling him. The droid, in response to a Wookie cradling one of their crossbow like weapons, addressed him:

"These Wookies have been assigned to your protection. They will take you to a transport that will see you to the rooms you will be staying in."

Shooting one last look over at Yoda and Grakchawwaa, Harry returned the Wookie leader's smile, which turned into a glare at the open amusement on Yoda's face. Turning around, he followed the droid along the platform's edge to the gantry leading across to the next platform.

The landing platforms, elevated above the city itself, provided a direct view to the clean-up works going on below. Ignoring the motions of his entourage, or the droid's attempts to get his attention, he looked down at the city. Teams of Wookies and a multitude of small craft were buzzing around the damaged areas. He could make out rubble being removed from the side of a building. The avenue directly before him, he saw, had several craft operating together. Wires had been attached to them and they were lifting the wreckage of a crashed transport from the street. The transport, Harry noted, was scorched around the cockpit. Sweeping his gaze to the left, Harry observed that another avenue bore testament to the grim toll: three neat lines of bodies on stretchers had been arrayed, and Wookies were walking along the rows. Lifting his gaze towards the nearest open expanse, he spied the square that he had unleashed fiendfyre in. A large blue projected symbol was hovering in the air. From the cross, he assumed a field hospital. Dismissing all thoughts of politics from his mind, Harry told the droid of his intention. The entourage hastily reassembling around him, he made for the lifts down to the streets.

 **Last Lesson**

Voices swam in in his mind as he writhed on the floor, fighting the vertigo that had overcome him. Hissing, shrieking, accusing, screaming and pleading, the voices echoed in his skull. Pain undulated across Sidous' body in waves as he fought to prevent himself from screaming as black chords constricted around him and held him down. Around him the mist was taking shapes. People, beasts and even the edges of buildings could be made out in the silver gas before something else emerged from the vapour. The voices subsided and the figures receded. Slowly, from the mist above him, a silhouette formed, and the wispy voice of Darth Plagueis resonated through his mind and body shaking him to the core.

"Darth Sidous, you have disappointed me. Your ambition is wasted on the old war, when there is something so much grander to conquer."

Around the Silhouette, faces emerged from the mist. Faces of those he had killed and faces of those he had delivered personally to Plaguies. The silhouette shook its head down at him.

"So much potential, wasted on the trivial. Once I thought you might understand, but I see now. You do not possess the aptitude to grasp my purpose on your own."

Struggling, Sidous was unable to avoid the line of vapour that had descended onto his face. Eye's wide, he watched as it ghosted over his mouth and moved towards his nose. Grasping in desperation for all of the power he possessed, Sidous let loose a shock wave, and as if from a great distance heard two small thumps, doubtless belonging to the stone braziers. The vapour, undisturbed, continued to crawl over his face.

"Consider this your reward: one last lesson as to the nature of the force before you pursue your little game for services rendered. I must thank you, after all, for unearthing the creature on Kashyyk; such a specimen is greatly appreciated."

Above him, the figure drifted closer up to the point he could make out the edges of a hooded face, until the vapour reached his eyes, obscuring everything. Muffled now, Plaguies' voice came more into his mind than his ears as his eyes started to sting.

"Perhaps you will yet learn. I offer you the opportunity. Close your eyes, and open your mind to magic."

It felt as if he was staring into the wind as his vision blacked. Trying to blink, Sidous found himself standing. Cautiously taking a few steps, he observed his surroundings. A dark room, lit by a single torch rather than lights. A desk, old paper rather than a holoconsole scattered across its tops. The walls were lined with books, or rather, the floor was weighed down by the stacked books against the walls. A door to his left opened. Sidous levelled his hands at it and blasted it with lightning.

The air seemed to ripple as the lightning went _through_ the door and the robed person scurrying out from it. Puzzled and extremely wary, Sidous tried to clear this obvious illusion. No matter how much he tried, the room only wavered under his efforts. Biting back further anger at still being trapped, Sidous watched as the figure dumped a large tome on the desk, scattering papers to the floor. The person was muttering. He did not recognise the language. He did, however, recognise the name that was being angrily interjected between the other words: Harry Potter.

Interest now overriding caution, Sidous lent himself to observing. He watched, as with the flick of a stick, torches lining the room blazed into life, adding their light to the room and revealing earthen walls and broken tiles on the floor. A simple command rod, perhaps? Still muttering, the robed figure made a chair appear from nothing but air, levitated a feather and a glass jar of black fluid to themself, opened the tome and began to write. Thoroughly intrigued and mind racing with comparisons as to what had happened on Kashyyk, Sidous leaned over the stranger's shoulder. He noted how his hand simply passed through where wood and fabric should have been as he sought see what was being written. The tome was full of drawings. A red stone was most prominently featured, while human bodies, circles, and symbols intersected with notes in the margins made up the majority of the rest. Again, Sidous could not decipher any of the writing. However, some of the symbols looked very similar to some of the scarring on Plaguies' experiments. The man -Sidous had looked under the hood and identified gender- was writing fast, leaving the occasional black smear in his haste. Suddenly, the man jerked to a stop, the last line finishing with a long stroke to the edge of the page.

Whirling around to face the source of the sound of the sudden bangs and screams coming from above, the writer clutched the book to himself. Sidous watched as the man overturned his desk, careless of its contents, to reveal a depression in the floor, into which the tome was reverently placed. The depression was surrounded by more symbols- symbols that, under the mans hands, started to glow as he began to chant. The noises came louder as the man, sweating now, picked up the pace of his chant. Sidous could now hear shouting, words being exclaimed as if in desperation, and the sounds of explosions impacting on the earth filtered through the clearly shaking ceiling. The man and his book had taken on a deep blue glow as sparks of red came from the symbols on the ground. It was as the explosions stopped that Sidous saw the vial in the man's hands filling with bright silver vapour from the chanter's forehead, which had the wooden stick pressed against it. With a last few syllables and a flare, the book was gone, and the symbols splintered in the stone floor cracking the stone around them.

The noise of wood crumbling broke Sidous' observation of the damaged ground, and he looked up to the new arrival. Eyes blazing, Harry Potter stood in the doorway, blood flecked across his face and hands. He also had a stick, though this one was somewhat more ornate than the plain brown of the now smiling figure kneeling on the floor. Sidous watched as the man was briefly subjected to taking a clear liquid and was asked what seemed to be some short questions- a truth serum, maybe? Sidous watched as with a snarl and a flourish of Harry's stick, the man was dragged through the door by conjured ropes. The room faded with the man's exit, but Sidous barely just made out the small flame on the end of Harry Potter's stick before he woke with a start on a cold metal floor. Dragging himself into a sitting position and ignoring the shattered remains of the braziers, Sidous reflected on what he had seen. His plans would still go ahead, but this -he had trouble accepting the idea of magic- bore greater study. Plaguies still needed to die, but perhaps he should alter his approach. Sidous would kill him once he managed to wring everything Plaguies knew about magic out of him. Unsteadily regaining his feet, Sidous made his way back to the hangar, constructing new plans as he sought to alter the outcome of more than a decade's work.

 **Temple Matters**

Mace Windu, Jedi Master and, if he was completely honest with himself, the best duellist in the Order save perhaps for Yoda, was becoming frustrated. After exhausting his own avenues of enquiry, he had had no choice but to involve others. The cause of his current frustration sat before him in the form of fellow Jedi Master Ban-Yaro:

"Master Yaro, would you please explain just what you mean by there being an intentional leak in our communications security?"

The human Jedi Master crossed his robed arms across his chest, appearing the perfect picture of calm:

"Master Windu, the intentional flaw in our security; is part of an ongoing operation to track and apprehend dealers in force-sensitive children and their families. Jedi Knight Secura has already shown promising results. Do I need to reiterate the reasons I supplied to the council in doing so?"

Centring his thoughts, Windu recollected the meeting he had attended via remote holocomms whilst on a diplomatic mission in Hutt space. Someone had been tracking Jedi vessels and subsequently abducting prospective children and their families for unknown purposes. Records indicated the activities had been escalating in the last twenty years. Returning his focus to the matter at hand, Windu sought to make his needs clear.

"There has been a far more serious breach in our security, requests for a Jedi escort for a VIP from Kashyyk have been altered. This request came from Master Yoda himself, who contacted me personally. Additionally, a response bearing an id from this communications centre was sent out. I want to know if and how you can account for this."

Master Yaro seemed to stiffen as the gravity of this statement dawned on him. Windu noted with approval as the man's former sentinel training kicked in. Technicians and other Jedi scurried to their stations as Master Yaro ordered a complete sweep of the communication logs that Windu had given him, along with contact ID's. The screen at Yaro's own station came to life as he personally swept the high priority council messages for the past weeks. Leaving instructions to contact him on a secure channel as soon as something was found, Windu left for the sparring chambers as he sought to make sense of what was happening.

Windu did not pause on his way to the chambers, giving only the barest level of acknowledgement to those that greeted him. Reaching the chamber, he was pleased to find himself alone. Gently unclipping his lightsaber, the purple blade seemed to sing as he pushed down on the activator. Adopting an aggressive posture, Windu began his Vaapad movements as he processed what had happened.

Yoda had contacted him on the emergency line.

The blade cleaved the air in a horizontal arc as he pivoted.

There was no record he could find of Yoda having ever lodged his original request.

Purple blade sizzling, the air in front of Windu was bisected in a diagonal upward stroke.

He had confirmed with the Kashyyk security force that a Jedi Knight and padawan had been slain by a dark side practitioner who had escaped.

Lunging forward, Windu, lightsaber pointed forward, covered the length of the room.

Yoda was investigating and was caught up in whatever this new being, which every Jedi in the temple had sensed, was doing on Kashyyk.

A carefully arced force pulse sent Windu into a graceful backflip as he pushed off from the wall, lightsaber aligned to deflect imaginary blaster fire.

Demands were coming in faster than the Jedi could allocate personnel from a multitude of sectors, straining resources and forcing the deployment of padawans that normally would be considered too inexperienced.

Clasping the hilt with both hands, Windu slashed horizontally across his body, arching the blade for a return powerful downwards slash designed to break an opponent's guard.

He had been forced to include others in his attempts to identify the source of the breach and was now reliant on them in order to be able to proceed.

Pivoting, Windu brought the blade across his body, channelling his momentum into a straight thrust parallel to where his own throat would be on an opponent.

Reports were coming in from the few remaining Jedi Shadows that were still undertaking missions. Something had caused a stir in the criminal elements of the galaxy. Normal territorial disputes, some that had been going on for centuries, were no longer as intensely fought as before. The Hutts, in particular, seemed to be consolidating, rather than pursuing new grounds.

Sweating lightly, Windu deactivated the blade and listened to its familiar hiss as it retracted.

Finally, a shroud had been gathering for many years over the Jedi's ability to perceive events. Even he had noticed the decline in the admittedly uncommon incidences of insight that the force would grant in response to stressful situations. Older and more experienced masters, such as Cerean Master Ki Adi Mundi, had failed to sense deception by individuals that non-force sensitive individuals had correctly mistrusted, subsequently resulting in new problems in the outer rim territories. It all indicated a trend. To what, however, even Yoda was unsure. Resigning himself to waiting, Windu made his way back to his quarters, pointedly ignoring the small group of padawans that had been watching his practice.

 **Help**

Walking the streets, entourage in tow, Harry thought about how little some things seemed to have changed. It appeared that whatever time he was in, people, regardless of species, were still happy to attack each other for one reason or another. Pausing by yet another pile of rubble, the group watched as Harry yet again levitated the broken pieces of building and street before returning them to pristine condition. The shock had faded after the first time he had done this. It had just as it did here, revealed a body. Silently, two Wookies broke off from his entourage and collected the corpse. As a group, they waited until a wooden craft descended from the sky and collected it. With sadness, Harry watched as the ship headed in the direction of the plaza he had seen previously.

Street after street, Harry repaired what could be repaired. Substance and form was easy. Returning life, though, on such a scale and after the first few minutes of death, was beyond even him. Slowly, the group made its way to the plaza. The group had grown significantly since the landing platforms. Wookies of all ages and a smattering of other beings had gravitated to the group. Children watched him in awe, the adults in a mixture of sadness and anger. The word Jedi was bandied about every-time someone joined the group.

Reaching the plaza, Harry confirmed that it had been turned into a field hospital. Stretchers in neat rows bordered by temporary tent-like coverings stretched its length. Security personnel in uniform handed out food and water in the centre of the plaza, directly under the massive projected blue symbol. Several beings, including the one Harry had last left crying in his own hospital room, were attending to patients in a separate area cordoned off from the rest. It was to this tent that Harry made his way, calling the droid over as he did so:

"Tell everyone, including my guards, that I'm going to help here."

As the droid relayed his message, most of the group dispersed. Those that remained, aside from his guards, had an all-too-familiar look about them. The droid, without his prompting, translated dutifully as they blocked his way. None seemed to be Wookies, however. It was a tall, green being, with what could have been extended fleshy tails protruding from the back of its head, that was obviously quite agitated.

"So, Jedi, you come to help only once the trandoshans attacked. If you're so powerful, why didn't you stop them before they attacked?"

At the conclusion of this statement, sounds of agreement came from the group behind the spokesperson, and upon Harry's query, the spokesperson was identified as a Twi'lek. The Wookies in his entourage seemed to take great offence at the comment and very nearly bowled him over from the sound of the roars that followed. Quickly, Harry cast a calming charm on the Wookies before addressing the smaller, now extremely frightened group before him:

"I am not a Jedi, and I had no idea there would be an attack. I am sorry that it happened, but I did my best to help. Now, if you will get out of my way, I shall continue to do so."

This, coupled with the placated Wookies, seemed to only embolden the green Twi'lek who, stepping forward from the group and into his face, promptly started yelling. Harry barely needed the droid to understand the gist of what was being said. They were all the same questions he had faced before-from the press his whole life, from the ministry after Voldemort's fall, from every single person who had not been involved in conflict but had still been affected by it: "Why me, and why didn't you stop it from happening?"

Wiping the spittle from his face and sighing, Harry gently and carefully applied a calming charm on the group before him. Unlike the Wookies, who he had calmed immediately, here he layered the strength in increments. The angry shouting reduced to semi-accusatory statements that in turn gave way to sobs. Applying the charm like this meant that the people before him still felt angry, but as anger reduction was the main intent behind the charm, it left them feeling more of everything else. The Wookies were shaking their heads behind him and getting agitated again, this time in response to his forcible calming. Gently patting the crying Twi'lek on the shoulder, he explained to the droid just what he had done and left it to tell everyone else what had happened as he continued on his way to the medical area. He never paid any attention to the several floating orbs that had been following the whole journey with the letters-if he had bothered to ask what they were- HNN on the side.

It was with a forced smile that Harry entered the medical area, and the smile fell as he was spotted by the one whose robot he'd broken. Running a hand through his hair in exasperation as he once again was on the receiving end of yelling, he wondered just what it would take to let him help. After all, thats what he was here for: to help.

 **Beginning**

Darth Sidous registered the arrival of his current apprentice on board his scimitar, Darth Maul. The heavily tattooed male, Zabrak, silently The male, heavily tattooed Zabrak silently made his way up the central corridor, took his position behind Sidous' left shoulder, and knelt, head bowed. Addressing the Zabrak, Sidous input commands to the communication array:

"I see you have destroyed the pirate scum that fled from Kashyyk."

Maul raised his head, horns propping up the lip of his black hood:

"Yes, Master, the trandosahns have been disposed of. I have left no trace that could be tied back to either of us. The Jedi will find nothing."

Sidous sensed the pride in his apprentice's words and enjoyed the fleeting bloodlust that had slipped into Maul's presence at the recollection:

"Excellent. You have done well, my apprentice. The Jedi have already secured the vessel and are no doubt scouring it for anything informative. I commend you on your prompt response."

A smile tugged at Sidous' lips as the feeling of pride slipped further into Maul's presence. Maul was an able, if direct, weapon, and was best wielded as such. He was one who could easily challenge most Jedi Knights in single combat; however, he lacked in understanding when it came to the true power of the force. Sidous continued:

"You are to make your way to Naboo and assist the Trade Federations ,Vicerory Nute Gunray, in whatever means you prefer, though I don't think I need to remind you of the need for stealth. I have arranged matters such that I am sure Jedi will be deployed."

Anger, excitement, and determination practically sang from Maul as Sidous turned his attention fully to his apprentice.

"This is a test, Maul. Disappoint me, and you know the consequences. Succeed, and I will grant you one name to hunt from our misguided foe."

Darth Maul's fingers twitched, a habit Sidous had come to associate with anticipation. Sidous had aimed and primed the weapon, now to exert control.

"Before you depart, however-"

Sidous relished in the apprehension that came over Maul as Sidous let his own presence dominate Maul's.

"-I believe a test of your fortitude is in order, Apprentice."

Swallowing nervously, Maul dropped his gaze to the floor and, to Sidous' displeasure, closed his eyes.

Allowing the rage, frustration, and loathsomeness to feelings of being powerless surge up within him, Sidous let loose a blast of lightning that struck Maul in the chest. Maul writhed silently on the ground as the arcs of energy rippled over his body in blue trails and sparks. Drawing upon his own fear of Plagueis, the lightning intensified and, with the sound of thunder, picked Maul off the floor and slammed him into the bulkhead that led to the exit ramp. As the force flowed through his outstretched hands, Sidous felt whole. The dark side swelled within him as he tapped its intoxicating power. Remembering himself, Sidous listened with apathy as Maul started to scream and smoke began to curl up from his thrashing form. Ceasing his barrage, Sidous assessed his apprentice's quivering form and found weakness.

"It would seem, Apprentice, that I may have been premature in conferring upon you the title of Darth."

Ignoring the wide eyes of the slowly recovering Zabrak at his feet, Sidous turned towards the blinking communicator. The viceroy it seemed, was living up to his low expectations. Still, a craven puppet was no less useful than a courageous one. Maul, recovered but for a slight tremor in his hands, resumed his original position so as to be just within the sensor's range for inclusion in the feed. Basking in the poorly concealed fear, underscored by surging anger behind him, Darth Sidous opened the communications and initiated the opening gambit.


	6. Chapter 6

**Authors Note:**

Hello people, I'm back!

Its taken me much longer than I would have liked but here I am, sound and (mostly) whole.

Thankyou for your patience and to those who sent me their suggestions for other Fanfics to read, I've been learning alot from them.

Welcome back to Eurospawn who has kidly picked up the Beta position again for me, your help is invaluable.

Thats enough from me, read, enjoy, review and if to those who flame, please tell me why so I can improve.

Tarrus

Stirring the Pot Chapter 6

 **Newsworthy**

Yoda was resisting frustration as best he could as he sat behind Chertins desk watching the holo news unfolding its latest story. Despite explicit instruction, it seemed that with the lifting of martial law, the Holo News Network, premier inter-system news broadcast corporation had gotten wind of Harry and his peculiarities. He did not doubt that he was watching the same broadcast that as trillions of others around the galaxy. Privately, Yoda would at times, entertain the idea of supporting sanctions on the press, his growing headache was indicative that this was going to be one of those times. Eyes fixed on the screen, he watched as the Bothan and Cathar reporters again cut to their captured footage.

"As you can see on display is the terrible wreckage that the latest slaver raid on Kasshyyk has left behind. This abhorrent act , that contradicts the very essence of our republic has resulted in a still unknown number of casualties. Fortunately the valiant Republic Security Forces were able to intercept and prevent the raid from causing further damage. This raid further makes us ask just what the Jedi are doing to keep the peace."

Yoda flexed his fingers on his Gimer stick at the Jedi comment as the Caith reporter took over.

"Indeed Kuroth, one must wonder as to the Jedi's true ability to keep the peace, especially when it is rumoured that Jedi Master Yoda himself was in the vicinity. Our thanks, and surely the thanks of all law-abiding Republic citizens go out to Commander Chertin for his quick response to the incident. However, Commander Chertin and Master Yoda aside, it seems someone else has taken the scen on Kashyyk, that's correct isn't it Kuroth?"

Knowing just what was coming next didn't stop Yoda from keeping his eyes fixed on the screen, though using his personal communicator he indicated to his on loan protocol droid to return.

"Yes it is Bora, the footage we are about to show will highlight this unknown human males actions in the assistance of the relief events. Firstly, what you are about to see may be distressing to some of you, and secondly, we must make clear that the young man's identity and affiliation to the Jedi Order is currently unknown though with Master Yoda's presumed presence it is considered to be likely."

As the screen cut to the actual footage, Yoda took in the unfortunately high quality images of Harry's face as he lifted rubble from the streets, and seemingly returned pieces of damaged buildings to pristine condition. He continued to watch as Harry somehow talked his way out of a direct confrontation with a group of survivors and took in the obvious signs of forced mind alteration in the attending Wookies. It was only as Harry made his way into the field hospital when the footage cut out and the reporters began to postulate, that Yoda activated his hover chair and made his way to the buildings private landing pad. Harry was about to need a crash course in Republic politics and for it to be made perfectly clear just why Jedi custody was a good thing. Yoda could nearly hear the voices of any number of groups around the galaxy as they discussed just what could be done with an apparently unattached force user.

Sorting his thoughts and to the world at large appearing the picture of calm, Yoda reflected on what was to be done. The HNN assumed a Jedi connection, so would everybody else who did not know what to look for. However, of those that did, many were not people who Yoda was in the least bit prepared to allow access to someone of Harry's capabilities, willing or otherwise. His options it seemed, had just been narrowed considerably by that broadcast. Reaching for his communicator, Yoda opened a link to his droid. 

**Basics and Understanding**

Harry eyed the droid as he finished tending to his latest patient. Hands glowing green, the Wookie on the stretcher stared as the flesh beneath the glow reknit and the burn faded into pink hairless skin. Harry had stopped worrying about the incredulous and awed looks he got every time he did this, he was much more interested in what the droid had been and was continuing to reveal. Especially since he had discovered that the droids express purpose in being given to him was to bring him up to speed with a lot of information:

"So, full-fledged AI actually exist, but they are banned from being installed into mobile bodies?"

The droid, who seemed rather intent on watching the Wookie that was quickly being ushered out of the tent by a now wholly cooperative doctor as another was brought in, responded:

"The ability to manufacture AI capable units is a legal area that is still difficult for researchers and industry to enter despite the theoretical ability to do so. My current frame would be capable of housing such a enabling device whilst my owner has never pursued such a course of action, doing so would mean I would be confined to a secure facility with no means of interacting with anything electronic."

Gently applying his hands over the bandages wrapped around the newest wookies kneck, doubtless due to one of the restraining devices he had saved Sheowtulla from, Harry poured himself into the magic and willed the wounds to heal. As the magic started to kick in, he again questioned the droid:

"So the Republic, which centralises the government of the majority of inhabited planets is the one who makes such laws?"

Eye's or as Harry had been informed by the droid, optic sensors, fully trained on the patient, it continued to fill in some of the blanks:

"Yes, though the majority of planets differ in what degree they adhere to the laws due to reasons ranging from cultural, religious and biological. Some laws, such as slavery are expected to be universally enforced despite these differences, excepting extreme circumstances such as the Geonosian Hive hierarchy. The security forces are tasked with general law enforcement whilst the Jedi are routinely requested by the senate to undertake diplomatic, peacekeeping and exploratory missions."

Frowning at this last piece of information, Harry was somewhat disturbed by the use of the word 'request' in the droids answer. The droid had already outlined how the Jedi seemed to maintain their order, and Harry didn't like it at all. Removing children from their families simply for displaying abilities beyond what their parents could do, sounded rather close to how the governments of Old Earth had treated Psionically talented children. Doubled with their philosophy of denying the expression of some completely natural emotions left a deep sense of apprehension in Harry's mind. Control was all well and good, but to actively deny part of your emotional spectrum was something else.

Movement and his hands being clasped in a single large furry hand broke him from his thoughts. The Wookie was healed, and looked like it was about to hug him. Fortunately, before it could do more than raise itself off the stretcher, it was collected by the doctor and taken out of the tent with the doctor excitedly waving a metal instrument around its neck as the Wookie happily growled at him. Seating himself on the stretcher, Harry let out a yawn as the day's use of magic caught up with him. A metal digit tapping him on the shoulder drew his attention back to the droid:

"Master Yoda requests we meet him at the Security Offices, he wishes to make clear its an urgent matter and that Commander Chertin has left on a system patrol. A speeder is waiting for us at the edge of the courtyard."

Tiredly running a hand through his hair, Harry stood up from the stretcher and let the droid lead the way. He'd honestly forgotten about Chertin, and whatever Yoda had to say, he had a feeling he wasn't going to like. Deciding to ask a final question, Harry stopped the droid from exiting the tent.

"Why are the Jedi so against experiencing certain emotions? I have and do feel them regularly. I mean, I understand being angry with people and even hating them with enough cause, fear is a basic instinct, surely it can't be that terrible to simply have it?"

Harry's unease grew as the droid seemed to hesitate, something that so far it had never done when responding, its subsequent, rather more regimented answer reinforced this feeling:

"Jedi doctrine states that such emotions are the key factors in one turning to the dark side of the force. I advise that you consult with Master Yoda." 

**Disagreements and Disappearing**

It had been a somewhat tense ride on the speeder back to the embassy building for Harry, not helped in the least when he sighted the small green form of Yoda waiting for him when they landed:

"Good of you to join me, it is, Mr Potter."

Frowning slightly at the neutral tone Harry returned the greeting and allowed himself to be ushered into what appeared to be a private elevator. Indicating the droid that accompanied them Harry addressed the small alien:

"Your droid tells me you have something urgent to tell me?"

Harry's direct question did nothing to outwardly phase his companion but the intense scrutiny he could feel in the air around him combined with the ghostlike tendrils that skittered over his perception had set his teeth on edge:

"Understand, I do, that concerns you have about entering Jedi custody, yes?"

Relieved at the bluntness, if not the subject -or the method- Harry decided to be brutally honest.

"I understand that your, order, denies several fundamental aspects of what makes a person. Coupled with what appears to be government sanctioned removal of children from their parents. Both of which you justify in the name of controlling your abilities, these are things I find myself unable to condone."

Allowing this to sink in for a moment, Harry continued to outline his position:

"Additionally I am well aware that you wish to either absorb me into your order, deny the use of my abilities to others or simply make me beholden to yourself or the Jedi in general. None of which I shall allow through coercion, and yes, I can feel you trying to 'guide' my emotional state."

The ghosting tendrils immediately ceased, replaced by an unnatural stillness in the air as Yoda, bobbing gently on his hover chair, openly examined Harry:

"Greives me it does, that you feel this way Mr Potter. But I cannot allow you to act without Jedi supervision at least, the Wookies and I, come to an accord on this subject, we have."

This last statement heralded the stopping of the lift and as the snap-hiss of the doors faded. Harry tiredly surveyed the team of ten security personnel, headed by a smug looking Chertin, all armed but thankfully not pointing their weapons at him. It was Chertin who broke the silence:

"Does the VIP require assistance to his new accommodation, master Yoda?"

Resisting the urge to banish the smug toad like man on principal. Harry turned back to his gently hovering host:

"I see, so you have even foregone the illusion of allowing me a choice."

Harry was not expecting this to flap the so far stoic green being next to him, and was surprised when Yoda offered an apology:

"Want to take this action, I did not. Choice, I do not have. Your presence, too public it has become to the galaxy. Accept such a risk you present, I cannot."

Sighing at the implied politics, Harry reached for his tired magic. Sensing the rush of power welling beside him, he dove straight for Chertin with one last parting shot at the venerable Jedi Master as his body began to disappear:

"I am sorry too, but I cannot, and will not be bound by anyone." 

**A Plan**

On reflection, this had probably not been the best idea that Harry had ever had. He was currently catching his breath, nursing a thoroughly bruised side courtesy of Yoda, and hidden in a room full of unmoving droids with the lights off.

Tiredly, Harry ran a hand through his hair, fighting nausea as his magic made its displeasure known. Disillusionment may be a fairly simple spell, but its constant draw on his depleted reserves had become problematic for the already tired wizard. Swearing and the sound of boots stopping outside the door made him hold his breath, as he strained to listen to the muffled and slurred sound coming from inside his cloak as the newcomers tried to open the door. A door that Harry had jammed by ripping the control console off the wall:

"Sergeant, why are we chasing this guy? I mean the whole building is on lock-down, even Yoda would have trouble."

The frustrated sigh from the left, Harry guessed came from the sergeant as sparks showered from the damaged console on Harry's side of the door.

"Damn door, must be another Gizka infestation, I thought the traffic control centre was on-top of that. Make a note private, and we'll notify maintenance"

The sparks ceased as whoever was fiddling with the console stepped back. The first voice, after a moment repeated its question. There was a pause and another frustrated sigh before the sergeant resumed speaking:

"Look private, you weren't in the room when he got away. He did something to Chertin stealing his blaster on the way, poor sod is is still in hysterics, slipped straight past our security identification field, nabbed the head off of Yodas droid and he did all of this, and took a direct hit from a force attack _, from Yoda_. If that doesn't scream jedi level trouble to you, you've got a long way before promotion."

It was a nervous sounding voice that responded, and Harry couldn't help the alarm that it inspired as the gun he had stolen suddenly felt heavy in the pocket he had stowed it within:

"Its a good thing we have both the Wookie and the officer assigned in protective custody then, isn't it. I mean this guy is starting to sound like something from one of those old sith stories, who else could get past Yoda like that?"

The gruff voice of the sergeant and whatever he was saying in response faded, as the sound of boots picked up and moved along the corridor.

Wobbling slightly as Harry regained his feet, he brought the head he had stolen out of the folds of his robes and placed it onto the central table.

"Where would people in protective custody be held?"

He had not been gentle in removing the droids head so was unsurprised with its slightly erratic speech, he was however, able to make out what he wanted:

"Individuals under protective custody are held in one of two places. The cells for transfer off-world in the case of ongoing legal cases, and in the observation room for subjects at risk or involved in local issues."

Harry processed this, Sheowtulla at least, he was fairly certain, would help him at least get off-world. As for his assigned shadow, she had been remarkably helpful, even with the compulsion but he was unsure. He would need to find out if the compulsion still held. Harry readdressed the head:

"What makes a droid follow the instructions of one person over another?"

The droids, optics, flickered slightly before the light in the left optic died and the right one resumed its luminescence. Harry's time with the head was running short.

"Droids are either assigned to take commands from individuals by former masters whilst active, deactivated droids normally are still assigned to a particular master when not in use. However, droids that are frequently used by multiple individuals, are often reset to assume the first biological individual from the list of sentient species they come into contact with is their new master."

Frowning as the droid had not answered the question he had in mind, he tried again:

"If a droid has two masters, how does it know which to follow and when?"

The head seemed almost to struggle with the answer before giving it. As it delivered what he really wanted to know a plan started to form in his mind:

"A droid will follow a priority order first and foremost, even to the contradiction of another masters priority order if given second. Only the one who issued the first priority order can rescind it."

Nodding, Harry cast his gaze over the room. He counted an even two dozen droids, neatly aligned in their holding racks. All seemed to be of similar design to his current companion. Turning his attention back to the head on the table, he queried if this was the case here. The answer he received caused him to grin widely, even as the right eye gave out, accompanied by a puft of acrid smelling smoke and the sounds of sizzling wires. 

**Chaos**

In all of Yoda's long life, he could count the number of times he had witnessed someone managing to shrug off a direct force push on one hand. That Harry had turned near invisible, overpowered a commander in the Republic Security Forces (even if it was Chertin) and steal their weapon was difficult to process. The added, brutal theft of his protocol droids head had nearly seen him go for his lightsaber. He should have insisted on dealing with this solo. As he perused the security screens he listened to the search teams reports, it was imperative, now more than ever that Harry was contained. The reports were, unsurprisingly, absent as to the location of his quarry.

On the screens security personnel swept through each room methodically. He had told them that Harry was in a possession of a personal cloaking device, so they were equipped with scanners. The teams had non-lethal capture orders, and had been issued with some of the more potent arms which normally would only be used on expeditions to the forest floor. Yoda was not prepared to allow Harry escape.

Jaina, the officer who had been instructed to keep Harry under observation, even after the circumstances resulting in Harry's first attempt at flight. Was in the medbay, Yoda had purged whatever Harry had done to her, and it was the presence of this mind alteration that had contributed to Yoda's decision on containement.

Sheowtulla, the Wookie that had attached himself to Harry's side earlier ,was in the observation room, supposedly waiting for a debrief and to give his statement of the last few days events. Yoda could not rule out the possibility of Harry having knowledge of Sheowtulla's presence, so had assigned a team of four guards to monitor the room. The sound of the door drew Yoda's attention away from the screens and to the form of dark skinned human in a captains uniform saluting him:

"Master Yoda, sir. Captain Yoran Tessun reporting in Commander Chertins absence."

Nodding to the captain, Yoda allowed for the man to report, keeping an eye on the screens he listened as he watched a protocol droid emerge from a utility corridor.

"As ordered, teams 1 through 5 are stationed on the speeder landings and hangar. Teams 6 through 11 are sweeping the corridors, whilst teams 12, 13 and 14 have secured the VIP rooms. All other personnel have either been assigned to the entries and exits of the building, monitoring the security consoles or are part of the detail assigned to the Wookie. Do you wish to contact the Wookies, master Yoda?"

Eyes glued to the screens, Yoda tracked a team, scanners extended combing the main atrium followed by a droid:

"Captain Tessun, thank-you for joining me, I do. Hope, I do, that Commander Chertin recovers swiftly. Useful, it would be, to have additional teams from the patrol vessels."

Casting his attention over the captain long enough to see the man take his suggestion as it was intended, Yoda frowned as he observed two protocol droids meet in the corridor the captain had entered from and immediately turn around the way they came:

"I will send for additional personnel immediately, master Yoda. I really do think we should notify the Wookies, I have been briefed on the individuals powers, and his suspected ability to travel vast distances makes me question if he is even still in the building. With the Wookies assistance we could lock down the space-port, at least ensuring he does not make it off planet."

Eyes back on the screens, Yoda tracked several protocol droids as they seemingly meandered through the rooms and corridors. However, his suspicion continued to mount as each of the droids bactracked upon coming into contact with another droid as the two from before had done:

"Refrain, you will, Captain Tessun from involving the Wookies. Harry, still here he is. Exhausted, I believe he is."

Sensing that the Captain was going to question his decision, Yoda cut across him:

"Explain, can you, Captain what so many protocol droids are doing out of storage?"

The Captain, who had so far been staring at a point just to the left above Yodas head standing at rigid attention took a brief glance at the screens before frowning as he watched two enter the power regulator control room from two different corridors. The response, whilst confirming Yoda's misgivings was not one that left him encouraged with the situation.

"Sir, I was unaware that the droids had been activated, the entire contingent of that model had been assigned to maintenance after the last trade dispute. They were due for reactivation next week, once the security subroutines had been re-uploaded."

It was as Yoda was turning back to the screens that he felt the force pulse in alarm. Summoning and activating his lightsabre with a thought, Yoda pivoted and leapt for the opening door, pushing the startled Captain to the floor. He brought his weapon down upon the droid that had been stepping across the threshold, and it fell at his feet, neatly bisected with the edges of his strike rapidly turning from molten to solid -albeit still heated- metal. The cracked power-cell, thankfully from one of the security teams stun guns, fell to the ground harmlessly from limp metal digits. It was then the sounds of stun blasts reached Yoda, just as the power failed. 

**Darkness**

Harry had not waited for the droids to hit the power. He was up and limping as fast as he could manage at the first sound of fighting, tethered by a line of metal wire to the one droid he had ordered to stay with him. He was against the clock and trusting more to luck than anything had gone with the first idea he'd had. He had observed that droids seemed to be just there for most people, part of the background. Even when using the now decommissioned droid Yoda had following him, it had warranted barely a raised eyebrow, even from the Wookies, who seemed to much prefer operating without droids from what he had seen.

As he limped, being tugged along on his tether he reflected on his plan. He had ordered the droids to do four things. Firstly, they were to take out as many of the security personnel at once as possible, simultaneously, Harry had spent several minutes making sure that each droid had gotten the non-lethal part of that order correct. Secondly he had assigned three of the droids to secure and deactivate the buildings power. Built with very few windows, the complex was entirely dependant on the power for lighting. He had been assured when laying out his instructions that the power failure would force all of the doors to be locked open. Third a team of two droids had been instructed to find Sheowtulla, Harry wasn't going to risk attempting to make it to both the hangar and the observation rooms, not with his depleted reserves, physical tiredness and his body feeling like it had been half pulped. Last, was his guide. It had been designated as both the relay for coordinating the other droids and the one to lead Harry to the hangar with the power out. Droids, it seemed could operate just fine in the dark. He was disturbed from his musings by the droid addressing him.

"Sir, the Wookie is en-route to the hangar, he wishes to ask what is happening and why he has been met by droids who have incapacitated four of the Republic Security members, on your instruction. Also I would like to report that several droids are out of commission, including the one assigned to the security control room."

Sighing and instructing the droid to tell Sheowtulla to meet them at the hangar Harry focused on what was happening now, explanations would have to happen later. At the moment Harry had made it to the central turbolift, and was waiting for the power to be switched back on. The alarm was sounded by now, even without an actual alarm so once the power was back on he could effect an escape. He had gotten past the majority of the search teams, and the turbolift would deposit him directly into the hangar.

"How much longer do you think L80?"

The droid didn't hesitate, something Harry was grateful for as he concentrated on the droids words to stay conscious. He was startled as another round of what the droid had described as stun blasts erupted from a room behind him, followed by a blue flash that lit the corridor and the thump of several people hitting the floor. Nervously looking back at the black again corridor he could do little but hang on his

"We shall be entering the hangar in five minutes at my estimate, once the elevators are back online, sir. Incidently, the number of operational L80 protocol droids you commanded has dropped to five, not including this unit"

Glad that the time was decreasing, even if the droid somehow seemed to be conveying irritation at him. Harry's concentration on staying awake was thrown for a loop as the corridor took on a low red glow. The security personnel had gotten the back up power online. The lifts were now back online. This also meant the security teams could now lock him out of the hangar, and he really didn't think he had the juice left to break down another door and stay conscious, he was having trouble walking in a straight line even with the tether:

"L80, is Sheowtulla still on his way?"

The light meant that Harry could now see, but he wasn't game to disconnect the tether. Swaying a little, Harry missed the response as he entered the lift with the droid and leaned on the circular panelling. The feeling of the lift engaging and the disorientating speed had Harry lurching to the side, and using the droid for a support. As the lift started to slow down, the droid again said something that Harry couldn't hear as his head started to feel heavy and his ears buzzed. Fatigue well and truly rearing its head, Harry managed to slide down the side of the lift and blink up at the red backlit droid standing above him. The lift slowed and the doors opened. 

**Sleeping Beauty, Flying Wookie**

Sheowtulla was confused, a little overwhelmed and very nervous, a combination that many who were not a Wookie would advise others to avoid. He was on his way to the Hangar, the droids had told him that Harry would be there, they had also told him that Harry needed help, to escape. He wasn't aware of any reason Harry would need to escape the Republic embassy of all places. He had done nothing but help people. Sure, he had Jedi like powers, but Sheowtulla had yet to see him abuse them without good reason.

So far, the droids had led him down several pitch black corridors. Occasional sounds of blaster-fire filtered from somewhere overhead. Sometimes these bursts were accompanied by much louder bangs that Sheowtulla was able to feel through the hand he had pressed against the wall in an effort to help guide himself. Every new burst was accompanied by the droids urging him onward. Unable to stop he tried to ask what was going on, but the droids simply continued onward. For several minutes the Wookie fumbled his way along in silence as his escort continued without so much as a pause when approaching a turn. Unable to see, it came as a shock when he walked straight into the back of the two droids who had been leading the way, a shock that Sheowtulla dismissed quickly as the red emergency lights came. Past the downed droids who were picking themselves up, Sheowtulla could see the central elevator door.

The recovering droids finished regaining their feet and gestured to the door, the left droid addressed Sheowtulla as the right droid pushed the call button:

"Mr Sheotulla, Master Potter will presently be arriving in the hangar. A small space capable transport has been commandeered by the attendant L80."

Mind buzzing with questions, questions that the Wookie had not been able to get an answer to since the start of this whole event. Sheowtulla nevertheless stepped into the waiting elevator with one of the droids without complaint. Once the door closed, he did however turn to the droid and with a frustration laden growl, wrap one large hand around its neck and easily lift it whilst his other crumpled the droids left arm to prevent it from pushing any buttons.

The droid, distressed noises emanating from its voice synthesiser finally gave its full attention to the pissed Wookie it was now staring eye to optic. The ensuing growls were delivered with determined promise. The L80, assessing its operational commands allowed some of its parameters to be considered irrelevant:

"Master Potter is currently being pursued by Republic security, under the direct command of Jedi Master Yoda. He has been listed as extremely dangerous, standing orders are to engage him with non-lethal measures. Commander Chertin however has stipulated a secondary shoot upon resistance caveat to this order. Master Potter is accused of being a threat to Republic security by local senior officer Chertin and his abilities have put him in the jurisdiction of the jedi."

Sheowtulla continued to glare into the back-lit optic and tightened his grip until the metal around the droids neck started to softly groan.

After careful consideration, the droid concluded that the rest of its instructions regarding secrecy were defunct, and continued to relay the situation:

"Master Potter is attempting to get off-planet, he has instructed this unit to deliver you to him so that you may assist him in doing so. The Republic security forces have destroyed most of the units Master Potter activated to assist him and are also enroute to the hangar. Jedi Master Yoda is leading the advance team, I estimate we have less than five minutes before the last of the disruption units are destroyed."

Here the droid trailed off, before imparting one last nugget of information that hit Sheowtulla over the head like a brick.

"Master Potter, is close to unconsciousness, he is displaying severe fatigue and difficulty breathing. His instructions specify that he is not to be delivered to Republic or Local authorities for any reason, including the event of his death."

Stunned, and frustration rapidly giving way to anxiety, Sheowtulla dropped the droid and watched the last few floors pass by. The droid behind him, stood motionless, unaffected by the events as only an automaton could be.

The doors opened onto a quiet, unattended hangar. Speeders, neatly lined along the far wall took up the majority of the room. Fuelling and maintenance equipment occupied a small stretch to his immediate right. Sitting idle in the centre of the hangar however was class B escort shuttle. At the rear of the vessel was a prostrate Harry Potter, his outer robe had been removed into a makeshift pillow exposing some type of scaled armour.

Immediately breaking into a run, Sheowtulla crossed the distance and upon reaching the prone form, carefully checked for a pulse.

A robotic voice caused him to spin around with a protective growl on his lips:

"Mr Sheowtulla, I am so glad you could join us. Perhaps you could assist by stowing Master Potter onboard and taking the controls. The last of the disruption units is presently being dismembered by a lightsaber, I urge haste."

The growl died into shocked silence as Sheowtulla numbly did as the strangely acidic droid had instructed. It was however with a great deal of care that Sheotulla picked Harry up and carried him inside the vessel.

The strange droid was issuing orders to the L80 that had accompanied Sheowtulla in the elevator. Concentrating on the flight controls, the Wookie preceded with the pre-flight checks as the damaged droid dragged a large fuel container to the far elevator. The ship was prepped and ready, all Sheowtulla needed was for the clearance codes to transmit and the hangar's flight signals would give him a clear run up-to space.

New sounds and a flash in the Wookie's peripheral vision caught his attention as the code failure warning blinked up at him. The elevator that the damaged droid had been heading for was now obscured by a wall of flame, the only thing he could make out was a heavily distorted flash of green. Sense did not return to Sheowulla until the now severley damaged droid came flying from the inferno and dented the left side of the transports body before limply crumpling to the floor below.

Disengaging the auto flight path, Sheowtulla yanked on the control stick and gunned it for the hangar exit. Only years of flying speeders through the dense canopy of Kashyyk prevented Sheowtulla from crashing into the hangar doors as the ship shuddered. Warning symbols erupted on the systems display, which now registered the shuttles back landing gear had been crippled. Swearing, Sheowtulla altered trajectory, heading straight up through the atmosphere shuttle being buffeted dangerously as he overrode the emergency systems trying to make him land again.

Through it all, Harry slept, pained breathes whistling from his mouth as the sole remaining L80 monitored his heart-rate observed its master enter into a nightmare and held on as the shuttle broke through the atmosphere, acquired its new coordinates and engaged its hyper-drive. 

**Grasping**

Darth Pelagius reached for the maelstrom as it dimmed, floating in his personalised meditation chanber, secure in his archive facility. He had everything the Jedi had on the subject now, Harry Potter, considered to be outwardly human, but underneath, something new to the Jedi, something _interesting_. The holonet was abuzz with speculation, much of it wildly inaccurate, but some intriguingly consistent with his own knowledge, he had already begun his search for the sources.

The Sith lord again grasped at the currents of life around Kashyyk, it was difficult now to mask such an undertaking from the Jedi, especially that irritant Yoda. Before it had been so very easy to slip through their perception, but he had adapted to the new situation, blending himself rather than masking his presence required more effort but achieved the same result. So Pelagius stretched his presence along the eddies were once they parted for him. He was so close now, he could taste the mind that had defied him before.

The flickering tendrils of power that flared from the presence of Harry Potter, once so strong as to burn at his own power were weakening, now was the time to renew the attack. Darth Pelagius would have the secrets he possessed, and so he would again advance towards immortality. The force aided and hindered him as he grasped at the consciousness of Harry Potter. It pushed him to his goal as water rolled down a hill, yet it raked claws of air across the stone of his will, trying to subvert his purpose. The departed screamed in symphonies of discord at his senses, trying to confuse, to disorient him and shield his quarry, but Pelagius would not be dettered.

Flexing his power, Pelagius risked discovery, and for the span of a pained breath from his prey he ploughed his way through the screams and snared Harry's force presence with his own. A wave of power smashed against the tired mind as its sluggish occupant cried out in pain. Darkness beat upon quivering walls of gold and shadow engulfed and feasted upon the thoughts unable to be pulled within in time. Determination and no small degree of fascinated delight accompanied the second attempt, a deluge of small fragments that dissolved against the wavering walls was swiftly followed by a thin lash that cracked across the walls and gave rise to a wave of pain that bled from Harry's mind, revealing just how thoroughly weakened he currently was.

Darth Pelagius gathered his power and fashioned it into the likeness of a spear. His presence lapping at the golden mind walls causing them to ripple into life then fade. It was in triumph that Pelagius fashioned the mind spear and with his burning obsession that he brought it down upon the construct, and it was in abject shock that his spear shattered against a white mass. Power, carrying the unmistakeable signature of a Jedi shattered his concentration even as his fury overwhelmed the intruder. A chorus of madness sent him hurtling back to his body as Harry's mind escaped him in a burst of light and the energies he had expended took their toll. The smoking form of Pelagius numbly crashed to the floor of his meditation chamber as he sought to scramble his presence. He had one resort that even Yoda would not question, shakily reaching out to the force Pelagius drew upon the otherness he had cultivated and _twisted_ the ripples of his presence. Dathomir would be receiving Jedi attention soon, and Pelagius hoped for casualties.


	7. Chapter 7

Hello everyone, Tarrus here back from the ether, at least temporarily.

This chapter has gone through a number of iterations as I best tried to address consensus of it moving too slowly.

Please keep the feedback rolling, this story has evolved very differently to my original ideas and I'm enjoying the challenge.

As always, thakyou to Eurospawn for their continued assistance/Beta work, please enjoy and I'll be back when I can.

Stirring the Pot Chapter 7

 **Orders**

Recently promoted Sergeant Jaina Comarilla stood to attention as Commander Chertin addressed her through his breathing apparatus from his position on a medbay bed. It had been three hours since Harry and Sheowtulla had made the jump to hyperspace and only within the last few minutes had the commander ceased being hysterical. The mans normally grating voice was weak and if not for a constant supply of painkillers, would blessedly have been unuseable:

"Sergeant, am I to understand that Master Yoda has implemented a defence against whatever the, fugitive, did to you?"

Hiding a wince at the strangled hiss that had accompanied the word fugitive, Jaina kept her attention focused on the wall just above the Commanders head:

"Sir, Master Yoda, before taking his departure on Jedi matters has assured me that my mind is no longer compromised and that the same method should not work again. Sir."

She watched as Chertin grumbled quietly to himself over the state with which Yoda had left them. Yoda had deemed the recovery efforts sufficiently on-track and no longer requiring his presence. So, the Republic Security Forces where to proceed without any debriefing as to the days events, or even an assurance of assistance being requested from the senate by the Jedi. All they had been told was that one Knight and Padawan pair, plus a normal Jedi would be en-route to further investigate. Chertin, was understandably angry over Yoda's actions. Wheezing from the effort of speaking, even with the painkillers, Chertin pushed himself into a seated position and in a much more serious voice, delivered his orders.

"Sergeant, you are to assemble a team of five from the crew of the Resplendent and take the cruisers shuttle. I am giving you a provisional rank of Second Lieutenant for this mission. Your orders are to apprehend the fugitive Harry Potter and take into protective custody the Wookie known as Sheowtulla. You are to take, if practical, the fugitive alive, I would prefer the Wookie unharmed but trust to your discretion, Second Lieutenant. This mission is solely the purview of the Republic Security Forces, I would be immensely disappointed should you feel the need to involve outside agencies, am I understood?"

Swallowing the lump that had crawled up her throat at the wording of her orders, Jaina nevertheless managed a clear affirmitive. Since Yoda's departure, the immediate summons to Chertin had sent apprehension through her. Fears confirmed, provisional Second Lieutenant Jaina Comarilla acknowledged her orders, excecuted a crisp about face and exited the room as fast as protocol allowed. Equal parts excited and terrified at her new mission she began compiling a list, a fugitive with belief defying force powers and protected by a Wookie. She would need someone who could drop targets from afar, a pilot, someone to push the jurisdiction problems aside, a medic, and lastly someone who could trap a Wookie successfully.

As Jaina began the preparations for her mission, the formal orders of Commander Chertin where logged by the attending medical droid and transmitted to the officers logs aboard the Resplendant. From there the logs would be automatically transmitted in the regular twelve hour status update to Republic Security HQ on Coruscant on an encrypted channel. A channel, which whilst encrypted could not be considered secure.

 **Traveling**

Sheowtulla stole nervous glances at his immobile friend as he monitored the hyperspace computers countdown. Harry, reclining in one of the shuttles berths was noticeably pale, and even after Sheowtulla had administered the limited medical supplies onboard, would still occasionaly press a hand to either his side or head and wince. They where on their way to Corellia, Wookies whilst far and above preferring natural surroundings had a tendency to congregate to places heavily involved in engineering. Sheowtulla himself had spent two decades working in the Correlian shipyards and still retained some contacts amongst the docks. Their best chance of getting a new, undamaged, ship would be there. Sheowtulla was broken from his musings at the sound of a pained grunt and feet hitting the floor. Not wanting to take his eyes from the hyperspace counter, Sheowtulla grumbled a greeting as Harry, accompanied by the Z-80, slowly made his way over and gingerly eased himself into the copilot chair, all the while staring in awe out at the streaming ribbons of blue light:

"Where are we going?"

Sheowtulla shot a concerned look over at Harry at the tiredness and strain evident in his voice, despite the droid taking over the translation:

"Corellia, I have some friends who will help us get a new ship, lend us some money and maybe even some information."

Harry lent back into the chair, tearing his eyes from the view to study the console. Remembering the events in his village, Sheowtulla clamped one hand on the, wizards, shoulder and growled warningly. Harry, smiling despite his aches, slowly raised his hands in defeat. Pre-empting the next train of thought Sheowtulla addressed the current concerns:

"Whatever you did that let you escape is going to mean people chasing us. We need to get somewhere safe and figure out a way to stop the manhunt. This ship is damaged and I won't risk another jump. You are in no condition to be doing anything besides recovering"

The hyperspace timer gave a warning that they where on approach. Sheowtulla busied himself with making as many checks as possible to ensure as smooth a landing as possible, ignoring the sour look on Harry's face as the droid finished translating. As shuttles went, this wasn't a poorly designed one, but the complete absence of shields, the missing back landing gear and the rather conspicuous indent next to his head would make landing a definite challenge. The only reassurance that Sheowtulla had as he fingered the hyperspace controller, was that Harry might be able to help ease the landing. However looking at his friends grey complexion, Sheowtulla was more comforted by his own flight experience with atmospheric craft.

Harry's eyes lit up as Sheowtulla eased back a lever on the centre of the console. The lights, which the droid had explained as passing stars, rapidly slowed. With a start, Harry realised that he was now looking at a glittering ball in a sea of black. Memories of the videos and images of astronauts from earth filled his mind and he could feel the anticipation building. Harry had just travelled from one planet to another, on a spaceship with an alien. As they closed on the planet, Harry noted what must be oceans and continents. Fascinated he missed the blinking red-lights on the console, he didn't however miss when Sheowtulla started to swear, dutifully translated in uncompromising detail by his new droid.

 **Fruition, complications**

Sidous rubbed the bridge of his nose, a habit he was indulging more and more of recently. The Viceroy had blockaded Naboo, Maul was already on the planet, waiting. The Republic Security Forces had sent a diplomatic team, a thin disguise for the Jedi onboard. His power-base was solidifying here on Coruscant, he even had an ear in the Chancellors office. The next candidate, should Maul fail had been chosen. All was proceeding according to the original plan. Except of course, here the screen of the data slate containing the transmissions from the Republic Security HQ cracked, for the small matters of the _thing_ he had unearthed, Harry Potter and the still breathing presence of Darth Plagueis. The cracked slate wobbled then snapped in two before the halves sped in different directions to shatter against the walls, unheeded by any in the Jedi temple, visible from his panoramic view .

Here in his senatorial suite, Sheev Palpatine had orchestrated the majority of his plan to see an end to the Jedi, and an end to Darth Plaguies. Carefully he had seen to the deaths of many Jedi, the infiltration of the senate by those with just the right influence and attitude for his purposes, the stage was nearly ready. The coming events on Naboo would tip the scales and he could move the course of history without interference and little risk. But now, because of his impatience, he was exposed.

The death of Plaguies would have removed the last true threat from the equation. As the Jedi would say, the force had been with him. But magic, magic had forced his hand. The force had led him to unearth this _wizard_ , and he was scrambling to compensate for the new variable this presented. Reaching for his collection of communications equipment, security automatically snapping into place. Darth Sidious set about further advancing his schedule. Clones, droids, Jedi and Sith, the war he had planned would redefine everything, and create opportunities. But first, Darth Plaguies would fall and Harry Potter would break. He had the location of one, soon, he would have the other.

 **Arrival**

Sheowtulla was busy, Harry's questions and frantic hand gestures where deftly ignored as the wookie wrenched the shuttle into the flight computers prescribed emergency landing flight path, peering through the flames as the shuttle sheared across the upper atmosphere. Re-entry without shields, or full landing gear and the retro thrusters attached would be difficult at the best of times. The dent in the cockpit however; Sheowtulla growled angrily as he was forced to yank the steering column hard to the left in response to the buffeting winds. Was making the hunk of metal even less aerodynamic than a normally shielded craft generally was.

Eyes wide, and heart racing, Harry watched the rapidly approaching mass of water helplessly. Fire, orange tongues streaked with red shimmered across the cockpits screen, rippling like a burning waterfall. The shuttle lurched then bucked crazily and Harry clamped both hands to his seat as the sudden inertia turned to weightlessness then back. The Z-80 had hooked itself into a riveted storage container by ramming both of its hands into the metal and clenching. From the occasional sound of tearing metal and the thumping that reverberated through the floor and up into his chair. The droid had not managed to secure the rest of itself. Beside him, he saw Sheowtulla growl at the computer screen, punch a few buttons and then yank the steering column, just as Harry noticed the water below start to fill the entirety of his vision.

Sheowtulla managed to get the shuttle back into a somewhat controlled descent by firing the front landing gears thrusters and again yanking the manual control back. The Corellian emergency responders where en-route to their projected crash site. They had medical and recovery teams already despatched. All that was left was for him to safely get them down, eyeing the escalating warnings on the computers display, Sheowtulla adjusted the flight path again. The water below was both a blessing and a potentially fatal problem. It made picking a spot to land considerably less difficult, no real potential collateral and if he got it right, an easy exit for them with the emergency crews chasing them. However, and this is what set his teeth on edge as he watched the flames die out and the water blur grey beneath them. If he couldn't slow them down, it would be like hitting a capital ships shields, with less chance to bounce. Swallowing the lump in his throat and hoping he was going to get the angle right, Sheowtulla allowed the nose of the shuttle to start to dip towards the water. Beside him, Harry, face now stark white stared wide eyed as he realised the meaning behind Sheowtulla's alteration. One way or another, they where about to land on Corellia.

 **Team**

"At ease, men."

Provisional Second Lieutenant Comarilla surveyed her, troops. The huge man to the left of the line, wearing full field kit and heavy armour, cradling his very nearly illegal, heavily modified T-21 repeating blaster was Corporal Mystral Lasclong. Jaina had chosen him from the field personnel logs for the repeated commendations on his file for his cool head in live fire incidents and, on a more relevant note, his proficiency with regulation and improvised trapping equipment.

Second down the line, wearing a far lighter and more personalised ensemble was cathar long-range specialist Jy Rhut. The male cathar was the second best sniper in the sector that she had access to. Jaina had chosen Jy over his more skillful counterpart as Jy was known to harbour a great deal of distaste for Jedi and by extension other force users. Jy's personnel file had revealed that the reason for his distaste stemmed from an incident relating to his brother being force sensitive, the file had only listed the case as 'mishandled' all other files relating to the incident were Jedi access only . Jy at least would not hesitate to take a shot at a force user with his, stun dart enabled, IQA-11.

Occupying the middle of the single file gathering was Jaina's Pilot and personal friend, human female Istive Schedir. Istive and Jaina had entered the Security Forces together, Jaina had gone into the ground forces, Istive had followed her passion into the Navy. Istive was normally a transport or freighter pilot, but she had upon realising Jaina's new rank confided in Jaina to having run other missions, missions that had not necessarily followed protocol. Having flown with Istive before on leave, Jaina believed her friend.

Second last down the line was her medic, dressed in his dark blue dress uniform. Carven Trennack was the single most experienced field medic this side of the core worlds. The stern man had served in civil wars, toxic environments, even naval engagements with pirates and rogue elements. Jaina had jumped at the chance to collect the greying man from his bunk on the resplendent personally. With the rank of Warrant Officer, Trennack technically had superiority over Jaina's provisional rank and he certainly had the contacts to smooth any trouble in the event he decided to take field command. Despite that, the mans reputation for pulling people through, and at times employing 'creative' field medicine on reticent patients was already lending a sense of security to her small task force.

Lastly, Jaina came to her comms and liason officer, also on secondment from the naval arm of the Security Forces was Chief Petty Officer Beracon Chara. Dressed in an immaculate full dress uniform and standing so rigidly at attention despite Jaina's single order that veins stood out on his neck, the twenty three year old was less than two years out of training and highly ambitious. This was the only member of the team she had not handpicked. Despite Chertins, 'standing orders' somehow she had re-boarded the Resplendent only to be greeted by her new shadow. The data slate she had been handed by the smug little sycophant had both Chertins and the Resplendent's captains signature attached.

Turning to pace back to the middle of the line, Jaina addressed her men:

"Our assignment is the apprehension of the fugitive responsible for the chaos of the last few days, confirmed force user, Harry Potter."

The words force user made her eyes flick across to Jy, his furred hands had slid to rest on his hip, normally where he would have his sidearm and vibroknife holstered. Unfazed Jaina continued:

"Secondary orders are to also bring in a Wookie for questioning, known as Sheowtulla, his being in the company of our Primary target is confirmed."

Jaina had been expecting the interested look on Lasclong's face, but the near feral gleam in Chara's eyes set her on edge:

"Both Primary and Secondary targets are to be brought in alive. However lethal force is authorised on the Primary should I deem it necessary."

Jaina's unease grew as Chara's face seemed to fall before going carefully blank as she continued her briefing. She found a degree of reassurance in Carvin Trennacks steady gaze and Istives encouraging look.

"Our targets have been confirmed as entering Corellian space by our contempories there as of six standard hours ago. They have been advised to provide surveillance and take all non-invasive action to keep them on-planet. This is an off the record assignment, it will not appear in your service records until such time as the higher ups deem it no longer confidential."

Carvin looked resigned and somewhat bemused, Istive was expectedly excited, Jy was still fingering the empty spaces on his belt and Mystral, looked equally excited as Istive. Turning her full attention to Beracon Chara, she watched the muscles in his jaw twitch in his blank face as she relayed the final part of her briefing:

"We are operating without active input from other branches, only I have the authority to include other agencies, including Jedi assistance. My orders can only be countermand by Commander Chertin directly. In the field Warrant Officer Trennack is my second in command. We are after a particulary strong force user and a Wookie, study the data slates I have provided you, they contain the individual details you will need. Pilot Schedir, I will meet you in the hangar bay in one hour, we will be departing in three standard hours time. Dismissed."

 **Test tube Harry**

Harry felt as if he was drifting. He was warm and also somewhat fuzzy as if he was currently wrapped in warm cotton wool, all of the aches that had been accumulating had eased, even his headache had receded to a dulled throb. His limbs felt as if they were weightless, he could feel his arms drifting up and down without effort despite the open sleeves of his robes trying to gently tug them downwards. His legs gently swayed beneath him, but he did not feel as if he was falling. A strange weight also seemed to cover his mouth and ears. Physical tiredness also weighed upon him even as his magic churned gently within him. He could hear the rushing of what sounded like bubbles in his ears, and as if far away, beeping noises mixed with voices. Finally mustering the energy Harry opened his eyes:

"Mmmmpphhh!"

Was all he was able to get out before he realised a mask blowing air was attached to his face. Taking further stock he calmed enough to register more of his immediate surroundings. Blue lit fluid surrounded him, he was suspended in a tank of see through glass by a harness clamped around his midrift. Bubbles escaped from the top of his mask in time with his breathes as murky figures seemed to appear on the other side of the glass. They were wearing what could only be labcoats. They had him suspended in a gigantic test tube. One was fiddling with a display facing away from Harry to his left outside the tank. A crackling in his ear heralded the arrival of a somewhat nasally voice, a voice that Harry had a hard time following with his limited vocabulary:

"...Potter...found...and wookie Sheowtulla...droid."

The last word was punctuated by the murky figure waving an arm at something he couldn't make out. A new voice, one causing the headset to crackle for an entirely different reason, belonging to what appeared to be a Z-80 unit through the glass addressed him:

"Master Potter, I see you have survived the crash intact. I have been asked to explain the situation to you, this conversation is being monitored. Please indicate if you are coherent."

The synthetic voice hissing over the sound of the bubbles was enough for Harry to nod his head, even as he processed the entirety of the message as the Z-80 continued:

"You are currently in the CorSec medical facility. You sustained significant injuries during the crash, your rapid recovery and immoveable possessions have been noted."

Eyeing the tube, Harry grimaced at the last comment as the droid continued:

"Master Sheowtulla was also injured in the crash and is currently undergoing treatment in the pod to your left, his recovery is estimated to take a week at minimum."

Flicking his eyes to the left, Harry could just make out the edge of another tube, though was unable to see anything within:

"The shuttle has been salvaged and the proceeds have gone towards the cost of your treatment. You are to be held here for observation until the medical team has cleared you, forcible removal of your mask will result in immediate sedation by the medical staff."

Suspicions confirmed, Harry trawled his memory for the bubble head charm as he sought to determine what the room past the tube looked like. The droids following, and last comment before it shuffled away, cleared the tiredness from his body entirely as the bubble head charm dislodged the mask from his mouth and apparated:

"A team from Kashyyk is enroute to retrieve you pending your recovery. This unit is to be reassigned immediately pending a memory bank wipe"

 **Disquiet**

Yoda felt truly ill at ease as he surveyed the surface of Dathomir around him. He had followed the strongest force trail above Kashyyk to here, following the ribbon of agony resultant from the maelstrom that had broken with the escape of the anomaly, Harry Potter. He had wanted to stay on Kashyyk to lend what aid he could, but he could not ignore whatever had caused this, even the demands from the temple and senate would wait until whatever this was had been concluded.

Dathomir was for the most part sparsely vegetated, the red light of the systems sun bathed his otherwise grey surroundings in a deep crimson as he considered his options. Many amongst the Jedi who were aware of the primary two indigenous societies. Considered them to be somewhat barbaric and backwards in their approach to the force and lacking in civilisation in general. His green painted Delta 6 starfighter rested on the top of the hillock he was standing upon as he contemplated the disposition of the native populace as he sensed a group headed his way.

The unique manner in which they wielded the force, and the more martial aspects of said societies would normally have Yoda giving the planet a wide berth without a diplomatic invitation. But the agony that resonated in the force had brought him here. He was sure that Harry Potter would not be found down here, but whatever had caused the force to scream in his mind needed to be found, and destroyed.

Fortifying himself against the conflicting sensations that wafted as if from the planets surface mixing with the lingering feelings of pain, Yoda bade his time, allowing the encroaching group to set up its encirclement. Dispatching a message for the temple he took note of the heavy mantle of dark side force on the groups leader as they picked their way up from the base of the hill. Red robes, and a tall figure enhanced the overall sensation of intimidation and the insidious twisting of force energy about her frame gave Yoda all the necessary information to understand just who had come to meet him:

"Mother Talzin, expect did I not to be met by you personally."

Cresting the hill and dwarfing the stoic Jedi master, the white and gray painted leader of the Night Sisters sect addressed him cooly, hostility promised in the mocking but guarded tone:

"Alone you have come, oh great Jedi, to what does Dathomir owe this honour?"

Yoda sighed internally as he began the arduous process of attempting to remain diplomatic against the only publicly, tolerated, master of dark side energies before him.

 **Signature Chaos**

"Fools, the utter fools"

Was Jaina's exclamation upon entering the destroyed medical bay. Her instructions had been specific. _Non-invasive_ _ **,**_ she had told them. The results of the heavy handed approach surrounded her. Cables sparked, the metal walls had been warped in places to resemble grasping hands and the bacta pods, empty of their original contents now housed the medical and security staff. Central to the room however, as if formed from the metal flooring was a simple circular podium with a data slate resting on its smooth surface. Turning her attention back to the room, Jaina took a better look at her surrounding.

A hole, large enough for her and her team to enter the room single file had been cut next to the inoperable, and strangely resilient door. Several blasting charges had already been applied to no tangible result. Jaina noted Carvin inspecting the tanks and their occupants. Each of the gently bobbing, unconscious incumbents sported, alterations. Large horns sprouted from the lead medical officers head. A fish tail had taken the place of the security sergeants legs, the rest, four other medical and security personnel bore similar evidence of their encounter. Carvin had, thankfully she supposed, already assured her that everyone was fine, other than the physical changes.

Beracon was eyeing the data slate impatiently, he had, after bullying the flight control tower into allowing them priority landing demanded all of the information they had on their quarry. Jaina had noted his diligence, but his annoying adherence to protocol at all times had left a negative impression on her. However, she could deal with that, it was his views on non-human species that were problematic, he had already earned himself several predatory looks from Jy. Carvin had also been noticeably less than pleased with him. She did not want to have to step in, but at the current rate something drastic may be called for, and soon.

Turning to the only other present member of her team, Lasclong and Istive on a different assignment, Jaina addressed Jy as he inspected a section of floor that looked as if it had been eaten away by acid:

"What do you think it is?"

The Cathar straightened and turned, his nearly glowing eyes in the darkness of the room met hers:

"Acid, that smells alot like blood. From the information in the files, I assume this is Potter's blood, sir."

Jaina internally noted the tacked on sir and caught the look of indignation on Beracons face and addressed him before he could take the chance to censure the Cathar:

"Petty Officer Chara, you are to acquire a chemical analysis of this acid and match it to the records from Kashyyk. Then you are to return to the ship and assist Pilot Schedir with the surveillance of the public security grid."

The mans chest seemed to visibly deflate as he threw a dirty look at Jy, a textbook salute at Jaina, and with a very quiet 'sir' marched out of the room. The surprise on Jy's face and contemplative look on Carvin's became businesslike as she decided on her next course of action:

"Jy, I want you on the ground with Lasclong, find the Wookie, and we will find Potter. Do not engage without calling in first. Srictly non-lethal measures unless I say so. Carvin, I want you to study that chemical analysis and advise Jy of any tranquillisers you think may work. Istive and, Petty Officer Chara will advise of any sightings and I will coordinate with CorSec security. Questions?"

Carvin was the one to address her, his unsettled demeanour as he leaned against an outstretched metal claw from the wall had her fighting the urge to smile:

"Lieutenant Comarilla, how do you expect us to find them much less capture Potter? No disrespect intended but with his apparent ability to teleport I do not see how this can be achieved once he is aware of us."

Acknowledging the point, Jaina nodded at Carvin's logic as Jy turned scrutinising eyes back to her:

"Carvin, you are correct. His apparent teleportation ability makes it impossible to contain him by traditional means. We can knock him out for awhile, but he has already demonstrated an absurd level of drug adaptation."

Jy and Carvin, their attention wholly on her both looked grim at her confirmation of the enormity of the task before them. Forcing herself to smile, in a hopefully reassuring way, Jaina outlined her plan as her commlink began to vibrate:

"It's the Wookie we need to capture and contain. Potter has been attached at the hip to Sheowtulla almost since he appeared, Potter even broke him out in order to get here. I'm positive that Potter did not go to all of that effort to simply leave him behind when things get difficult. If we can secure Sheowtulla, we've got Potter."

Extracting the commlink from her belt, Jaina opened it, only to be met by a cacophony of animal noise and Lasclongs franticly panting voice:

"Sir, CorSec found him and tried to corner him."

A roar accompanied by chittering, unlike anything she had heard before forced her to yank the link from her ear. The noise was soon followed by Lasclong swearing and the whine of his T-21 opening up. Startled by the noises emanating from the device, Jaina tried to get Lasclong back:

"Report! Corporal, what is going on?"

Scuffling noises followed by heavy breathing heralded the return of Lasclongs harried voice:

"Sorry sir, it's bedlam down here. I followed a CorSec heavy response team to the shipyards. They found the Wookie. I was about to contact you to sort out jurisdiction when a bloody stampede of animals came out of the warehouses. I've never seen anything like this Sir."

A low growl came over the link, quickly followed by a quiet but strangely calm 'shit' was the last thing Jaina heard before the link shut off to the sounds of several meaty thuds. Wheeling on her present subordinates Jaina yelled her instructions as she sprinted for the hangar:

"Carvin, requisition us the fastest speeder you can. Jy, tell Istive to get to Lasclong's location. NOW!"

Behind her, the slate blinked into life, catching Jy Rhut's eye.

 **Patience**

Harry had been reasonable, thus far. He had not permanently disfigured anyone, much less killed anyone who had tried to capture him. He knew that he was powerful, even by the standards of people who knew about magic. But as he surveyed the chaos surrounding him, he couldn't help the temptation to erase the memory of everyone in a 10km radius, get Sheowtulla and simply take the most heavily armed ship that took his fancy and hunt down everyone who knew he was alive and similarly alter their memories..

Animals, namely wolves, lions and bears with a few monkey's and perhaps some unnecessarily aggressive chickens were currently in the process of rendering the gun wielding interlopers unable to move. Harry viewed the sole remaining small circle of intruders with curiosity. The initial rush of conjured animals had quickly overwhelmed the majority of the uniformed grunts. But the huge man in what seemed to be heavy armour had rallied a few of them into a defensive circle. The man was currently mowing down a pair of grizzly bears, his large machine-gun type weapon spitting a veritable stream of blue bolts. Harry could smell the sizzling flesh from across the length of the warehouse. Sheowtulla, standing next to Harry after he had been summoned from his position at the warehouse doors was cradling his huge crossbow like weapon anxiously. Harry addressed him, the Z-80 floating behind him as it was otherwise immobile, having been fitted with something called a restraining bolt:

"Sheowtulla, your sure your friend will come through with a ship?"

The Wookie managed to tear his eyes from the sight of the two downed bears dispersing into smoke to respond:

"Vuunkin will not fail. He will bring the ship he promised us as soon as he is able."

Nodding absent-mindedly and trusting to Sheowtulla's word, Harry watched as the last few of their hunters, minus the armoured man succumbed to the animals around them. The man, whoever he was did not seem to notice the loss of his comrades. He simply continued to fire his weapon in a sweeping arc, keeping the encroaching animals at bay, one hand pressed against his helmet. Several baboons disappeared under the streaks of light, obliterated before they could fade into smoke. One managed to leap for the man's face and it scrabbled at the helmet, but it was quickly torn off and he stomped heavily on it before resuming his fusillade. Interest piqued Harry watched as a lioness used the cover of several cargo boxes to circle around behind the man:

"Sheowtulla, why is that one dressed differently?"

The Wookie, half his attention on the open roof and half on the two dozen wolves that rested at their feet hitched his weapon slightly higher before answering:

"The white one belongs to the Republic Security forces, the ones in green belong to CorSec."

Harry was unsurprised when the man went down under the lioness, he was however impressed when instead of going limp, he reached for a knife and began stabbing furiously upwards. One armoured arm prevented the animal from grasping his throat as the knife went in, again and again. As the lioness began to disperse, Harry, one hand raised, reinforced the conjuration and increased its weight, trapping the man beneath it:

The man struggled, despite the weight. The hand holding the knife desperately flailed as the lioness went limp. The rest of the animals, the majority holding the former combatants to the floor by virtue of simple weight went immobile as Harry ceased animating them. They were as good as statues now. With an idle flick of his hand, Harry directed the three dozen chickens he had summoned into the adjacent buildings, he needed to delay pursuit for now. A powerful thrumming from above, and Sheowtulla's gleeful exclamation caught his attention:

"Vuunkin pulled through, a Gozanti-cruiser, I should have paid him more."

Looking up at the gun-metal gray vessel, it just brushed the warehouses roof as it descended, a projection from beneath the front of the ship opened to reveal an insectoide like figure waving down at them. Sheowtulla happily waved back as he began to ascend the stacked packing crates that Harry had levitated before they had been interrupted. Floating the droid, himself and a surprised Sheowtulla up, Harry cast one last look at the downed figures below and relayed an instruction to the droid as it protested its inability to move under its own power.

"Z-80, transmit the message."

If they ignored the message, Harry would take the kids gloves off. He had a rather more important agenda than playing tag with an ill-equipped government, even if its soldiers appeared formidable. As he neared the vessels open door, Harry allowed the conjuration to slip from his control, for now he still held onto his patience.

 **A life's labour**

Plagueis was, cautiously happy as he hovered over the simple metal bench that was his current work station and once more suffusing the eddies of the force with a miasma of dark side energy. Yet another piece of the puzzle that was magic was ready to fall into place. It had taken his defeat above Kashyyk to come by the knowledge. The resonance of pain had sharpened his curiosity as his mind returned to his body. He had yet to understand just what he had seen in Potter's mind, but he was determined to unravel this new enigma. A pale hand gently caressed his forehead as he briefly recalled the sensation of passing through the force in panic, beset upon all sides by the voices and grasping hands of the dead.

It had been a strong image, standing out in intensity amongst the others he had gleaned, the sensations associated were crisp, if aged. Sadness, long endured grief and an undercurrent of righteous anger, that had the circumstances been different, Plagueisagius would have sought to exploit. Green light, laughter and a woman. A scenario that ended in the woman's pleas being cut short. Death, perhaps, or simply something to render another unconscious? Plagueisagius would discover this truth, as he would all others.

He had not the means, or true understanding to attempt pursuing such a hypothesis with any degree of certainty. But that would not prevent him trying, trial and error, the cornerstones of enlightenment. Once more, as he had done innumerable times in the past, Plagueisagius allowed his overwhelming curiosity dictate his actions. Slowly he turned to the terrified form chained to the wall behind him, as close an example of the woman in the memory as he could find. His right hand came to rest on the kneeling woman's red hair as terrified green eyes stared up at him, pleading. Plagueisagius, discarding the pleasurable rush such control over another granted him, pushed all thoughts aside as he concentrated on the stolen, tantalising images. He simply needed to know. Green light suffused the room as Plagueisagius intoned the piece of magic he had stolen from Potters mind, the syllables spat with tangible excitement:

"Avada Kedavra."


	8. Chapter 8

Greetings, it's been quite awhile since I've been around but here I am once more.

As always, apologies for the long absence, I have no excuse other than life being what it is.

Many thanks to Eurospawn for putting up with me so patiently in his beta work.

That said, read, review, and above all please enjoy.

Tarrus

Stirring the pot-chapter 8

 **Emulating**

"Another."

The long corridor, its bare metal walls evenly interspersed with white doors, echoed with the voice of the stations only living inhabitant as his voice lowered into an intense murmur. The echo's soon faded under the sound of shattering wood as the gentle glow of the corridors lights flickered slightly:

"Another."

Frustration laced the word as the air shifted in response to the power coming from the open door at the end of the hall, the occupant of the stations voice again issued from the room, quiet but strength in the words. Only to again be accompanied by the sound of shattering, noiselessness descended breaking the steady hum of the corridors lights as if a breath was being held. A surge in atmosphere, dutifully logged by the environmental control computer preluded the darkness that then descended upon the corridor as the lights failed entirely before regaining their luminescence as if a wave had passed over them:

"Another!"

Anger coated the demand and the air seemed stilled in anticipation, words, nearly bellowed resonated along the corridors walls, the power behind them making them unintelligible as the corridor shook under their weight. Shattering, accompanied by several heavy thuds and a gasp of pain rent the air as the anger surged as a rippling tide and the corridor went completely dark and the stations gravity control faltered. The hiss of hydraulic gears briefly broke the silence as every door along the corridor engaged its emergency override, locking themselves in order to prevent atmosphere escape. Nothing broke the silence save for laboured breathing accompanied by a muffled snap-hiss.

Red light pierced the formerly open door and protruded in the form of a short beam as metal sizzled and melted around it. It took several seconds for the beam to bisect the door. A harsh wrenching and squealing of the doors fittings bore testament to the sudden removal of the door from its normal resting place.

Anger and frustration, veritably simmering in his veins at yet another failure, Plagueis held his lightsaber aloft as he gently floated his way from the training area, left hand wrapped in the folds of his robes, back to his sanctum. Idly, Plagueis used the force to engage the backup systems, dull red light illuminated just enough of the corridor to see the way as his feet again touched the floor.

The station had been established in deep space as a storage facility primarily. But his wayward apprentice would have no knowledge of its existence. No record had been made of its existence, and Plagueis had not done anything relating to it since well before his erstwhile apprentice had even dreamt of politics as a career. Checking his anger, storing it for later use, Plagueis allowed his mind to turn to the problem he was attempting to solve.

He had gleaned a small amount from Potters memories besides the scenario he had already tried to undertake, before his rather, humiliating, withdrawal. Plagueis had seen a human child, a child with red hair holding some relation to the multitude of the rodent species that infested the galaxy in one hand. The child had also been holding, a stick, a stick which had been used, in conjunction with a language Plagueis had only two, memorable as they where, encounters with, to do _something_ to the rodent. The resultant light had been proof enough that an effect had been achieved.

Plagueis fought the pain in his throbbing left hand by smothering the nerves with the force. He had tried to emulate the child's use of magic. He had acquired wood from several different planets, each as diverse from the other as possible. An old protocol droid had been used to drill the, incantation, into his mind. No syllable had been mispronounced. Plagueis had even sourced several dozen rodents from Coruscant in order to attempt this. But, as he allowed a sliver of pain to work its way up the shard of Ayalayli Thornwood embedded in his blood slicked palm, Plagueis knew, just like his attempts with the woman, something was missing. No amount of magic he had poured into the attempts had done anything besides cause the timbers to shatter under the stresses. As he made his way to the small infirmary to expedite the removal of the Thornwood from his palm, Plagueis began to repeat the phrase he had been using for hours, the strange words still foreign on his tongue.

 **Seclusion**

Vuunkin and Sheowtulla were happily chatting as Harry grasped the flight controls listening to the droid explain all the knobs, dials and buttons. The metal controls were smooth under his palms and he relished the feel of the engine in lieu of rushing air as the droid droned on. He longed to properly fly the craft but Sheowtulla, after recalling the speeder incident had locked the flight computer onto a path towards the edge of the system. The Wookie wanted to head for somewhere called 'Hutt space' but Harry needed to find this other wizard, something had changed. Reality felt, strained, as if something was trying to push itself into being but was, mostly, being denied, most worrying though, it felt as if it was _within_ himself. Harry had only noticed the change since leaving Corellia's surface. In space it seemed, there was less between him and what he called the aether, at least less in the way of distractions. Giving the control panel in front of him a forlorn look, Harry stood up from the pilots chair and excused himself to the now silent members of the group. He needed to focus, and in the absence of a ley nexus, the Box would have to do:

"What's he up to?"

Was Vuunkins query to the also confused Wookie as the subject of their animated conversation abruptly stood from the pilots chair and brushed past them. Sheowtulla shrugged his shoulders, the action eliciting a protest from the now toppled and still immobile droid on the floor:

"No idea, but if its anything like what I've seen the last few days, you wouldn't want to miss it."

As his Verpine friend rushed off to follow the not jedi. Sheowtulla more sedately eased himself into the pilots chair disengaging the flight path lock, worry for the wizard all the while stirring in him. Harry had thus far been nothing if not in control of the various situations they had found themselves in, at least in control enough that Sheowtulla got the strange impression of an underlying boredom in some of Harry's actions. Since leaving Corellia however, Harry had been, tense and withdrawn. Even being put in the pilots chair had only momentarily lifted his spirits. Something was troubling his friend, and Sheowtulla wanted to help. But before he could go and address the issue directly, he had a call home to make.

The cargo hold, the by far largest area of the vessel was the only space big enough for Harry's needs. Reaching into the confines of his robes, Harry drew out a crystal cylinder filled with a silvery liquid. From the middle of the empty deck, Harry poured the vials contents in a circle around him and sat himself in its centre. Stretching out his left hand and pressing it into the silver fluid Harry, pushed from within himself and willed the construct to assemble.

Vuunkin watched in awe as the young humans hair swayed in an invisible breeze as the silver fluid began to rise. Strands of silver bubbled and spread across the deck as the mass rose, the circular shape twisting upon itself as corners emerged from the mass. A heavy clang of metal against metal resounded throughout the room as with a final shudder, a garland of blue light rose from the centre of the spectacle and plunged itself back into the mass, turning the silver black and burning blue lines throughout its surface forming a script Vuunkin had never seen before.

Sheowtulla's yelling from the cockpit snapped Vuunkin out of his stupor as he realised the box in front of him had seemingly grown around the reason he had managed to escape off of Corellia in the first place. More worryingly though was the sound of heavy, but quick feet stomping their way in his direction. Vuunkin had no desire, friend or not to get in the way of an indebted Wookie that would take the absence of its charge quite badly. Vaulting the cargo decks stairs, Vuunkin approached the cube at a run, hoping that Harry was at least audible through whatever he'd just built around himself.

 **What can we do?**

Istive felt very tempted to get her friend a drink as she gave her report of the day's absurdities. She had one last thing to detail to the stone faced visage of her commanding officer. Carvin was sitting across from Jaina with an encouraging smile, which helped to calm her enough that her voice didn't waver:

"On recovering Lasclong and providing the Corsec team transport back to the security offices, I received confirmation from Republic Security Command that a request from Petty Officer Chara had been received and was being processed."

Jaina's blank face met her worried gaze evenly, and the responding tone bereft of emotion, told Istive all she needed to know about upcoming events:

"What request is being processed?"

Istive fought the urge to swallow before handing the transmission transcript to Jaina, who proceeded to read it aloud:

"Petty Officer Chara, your request for details regarding the incident on file concerning field specialist Jy Rhut as it may be pertinent to your current assignment has been approved. The matter will be brought to the Jedi High Council for clearance on their end and a judgement regarding Specialists Rhuts continued presence on your task force will then be rendered pending subsequent details in light of your recommendation. Access to the files relating to the other members of your task-force has been denied without authority from your task-force leader, as the details therein are not to be considered operationally pertinent."

Jaina in a voice far more cold than Istive was used to, finished the last segment of the document:

"Reminder, no direct contact is to be made with Jedi in relation to this matter unless in an emergency. Authority to assume command in the event of compromised task-force members remains in affect. Highest priority in regards to returning the subject into Republic Security alive remains in affect, condition of secondaries is not a concern. Signed, Commander Chertin."

Istive watched, anxiety ill-hidden as Jaina calmly placed the data slate next to the one recovered from the destroyed medbay. She very nearly jumped when Carvin quietly dismissed her after thanking her for the report. The closing of the door behind her, muffled the angry swearing but did nothing to stop the noise of something being broken from reaching her. Lasclong, all smiles as per usual when not on duty hailed her from down the corridor:

"Istive! Thanks again for getting us all out of there, before you arrived we were practically crawling our way through the complex. Any word on what those damn birds were? Blasted things seemed to be everywhere. Have you ever seen a more sorry bunch than CorSec? At least they lent as a better ship"

Istive found herself agreeing with her counterpart regarding CorSec, their performance had by all accounts been poor, it had however seen their little shuttle replaced with an old Consular-Cruiser with minimum armament. Lasclong seemd to be waiting for an answer as her attention was drawn back to the room she had just left, half her attention on the angry noises emanating from the shuttles command room, she responded with much less enthusiasm than her counterpart:

"Good to see your fully recovered Las, Carvin was worried you might have gotten an infection from the animal that had your arm. As for the birds, no word yet, all the ones that were caught have since vanished, like the others."

Lasclong, seeming to finally notice Istives mood, and the noises from the room behind her. Sobered up immediately:

"So, what's happening?"

Sighing, Istive pinched the bridge of her nose before responding:

"Honestly? I don't know, Carvin and Jy seem to have something cooking for our next encounter which is why Jy's not here, and Jaina, I mean the Lieutenant, has put out a tag on their ship so they won't get far in civilised space. As for Chara, well I can tell you that no-ones happy about him, the commander has him tracking down the identity of the Verpine you saw currently."

Lasclong rubbed the shallow scratches on the arm that held the beast away from his throat and winced at the pull on his ribs as he thought about the day. His armour had prevented anything more than scratches but the weight of the thing had left his ribs bruised. He could have sworn the thing had trebled in weight once he'd knifed it before it disappeared. The birds during extraction had not been much of a problem for him, but the more lightly armoured Corsec team had not come out wholly uninjured. He was glad to hear there would be a rematch in the offing, but he shared Istive's reservations regarding Chara. The man did his job to the letter, then seemed to go out of his way to make problems, especially for Jy. The anti-human sentiment had a particularly stalwart follower in their communications officer. If Lasclong had it his way, the man would be left behind, preferably concussed. Istives voice broke him out of his reverie and he turned his attention back to her visibly worried frame:

"I guess I'll see you tomorrow, or whenever the Lieutenant gives out the next briefing. I'm tracking the freighter on long-range sensor and she wants to know their point of jump as soon as I have it."

Lasclong nodded, taking the hint he smiled at her and went to his bunk. As much as he was looking forward to another shot at this Wizard with his newly requisitioned trap gear, courtesy of a shamefaced Corsec corporal. He couldn't deny the urge to ask Carvin for something to slip into Chara's drink.

 **According to Plan**

The hologram flickered amongst the static and Palpatine bit back his smile until the transceiver had completely failed. The Viceroy was on schedule, or at least the Jedi had made him panic on schedule. Soon, Naboo would be left without its new ruler and the resultant public spectacle that was so carefully being engineered would be presented to the senate, at least certain members of the senate. Other matters too appeared well in hand, the bounty hunter had accepted the contract, and the Security Forces where on track. Smoothing his senatorial robes, Palpatine left his suites and descended from his private office to the greater auditorium in the centre of the Senate. The morning was taken up, again, by reports on piracy near Ryloth. But as a conscientious senator, he attended every sitting, no matter how boring.

The halls that led to the senates pods would appear full to visitors as the session was about to start. But to Palpatines eyes, the showing by senators was minute. Flunkies dominated the hallways, no doubt sent by their masters, too 'busy' or otherwise occupied to attend the mornings session. All smiles, Palpatine exchanged pleasantries with several junior officials, careful to mask the fact he knew very few of their names. Today would be slow and tedious, if the presence of the chancellor was missing, Palpatine would have given into temptation and sent his own, public protocol droid to record the discussion. Assured of the days course of events, and content to let other matters attend to themselves Palpatine strode through the corridors in confidence. The picture of poise and collected serenity, he strode into his pod and seated himself:

"Careful, you brute!"

Thoughts broken, Palpatine surveyed the disturbance several pods to his left. A Quarren, orange skin flushed in indignation was pulling itself up from the floor, Palpatine recognised it as Nrin, the current Mon Cal senator. Towering above him and growling in apology was a Wookie:

"I don't know what the senate was thinking allowing your kind access to the senate. Someone else should speak for you, at least the fish have the sense to let the wiser race conduct its planets affairs."

Interest piqued at the unusual presence of a Wookie in the Senate chambers, and idly dismissing the slur against the other prime specie on Mon Cal. Palpatine studied the markings on its minimal ceremonial adornments as he tuned out the pompous senator. Grackchawaa's the current prime ruler of Kashyyks family heraldry was emblazoned on the Wookies shoulder pads with a strip of cloth bearing the Republic motif tied around its neck. Concern tugged at Palpatine, the Wookies presence was unusual to say the least, much preferring to be isolationist. Which suited Palpatine prefectly:

"I must apologise for my friend senator, it would seem we have taken a wrong turn. We will depart for our entourage immediately."

Palpatine sharpened his focus as the presence of a Jedi amongst the entourage behind the door to the Mon Cal pod made itself known. The brown robed figure had just emerged from the pods door and taken the Wookies arm and was now steering the brute back the way it came. Whatever was about to happen, Palpatine had no knowledge, doubly disturbing was the fact the Jedi had until now been cloaked from his senses, such a precaution in the senate was troublesome. Eyeing the mostly empty forum space, something else came to his realisation. Without sufficient senatorial presence, the chancellor would be able to mandate. His assurance in his plans success dipped as the chancellors podium rose in the centre of the assembly. His confidence in the viability of his adjustments plummeted in the wake of the chancellor Valorum's address as he asked himself, why didn't he know about this in advance?:

"My dear senators, I apologise for the last minute change of plans but a delegation from Kashyyk has brought charges against the Republic Security Forces, in conjunction with a demand for the recognition of the efforts of a human named Harry Potter against the recent slaver assault on Kashyyks capital."

Fury bubbled swiftly within Palpatine as the implications for this course of action became apparent. Fury that turned to icy rage, carefully channelled internally, as the sight of the Kel Dor in Jedi garb that was seated in the delegations pod finally registered as to just who was with the entourage.

"Evidence and testimony have been independently verified by the Jedi temple with master Plo Koon in attendance to represent Jedi interests in this matter. We welcome the personal envoy of King Grackchawaa and Jedi Master Plo Koon to this august assembly."

In that moment, Palpatine promised himself to find a suitable end for the Jedi Master, but first he needed to do damage control. As discreetly as he could, Palpatine tapped a code onto his personal communicator. All the while seeking to make eye contact with the Vice Chair, Mas Amedda.

 **Unpalatable order**

Deeply troubled, Yoda brought his ship into land at the Jedi Temple. Hostilities had been avoided, barely, upon Dathomir, despite the barbs and veiled insinuative comments. So, empty handed, Yoda had returned to Coruscant. His communicator purposely switched off during his descent. Meditation, solitude and simply a chance to process everything that had happened was the single greatest desire that Yoda brought with him from his journey. However, upon viewing the entourage that awaited him upon the landing pad, he knew such a chance was fleeting at best. Mace Windu led the delegation, his robes fluttering in the downthrust of Yodas ship as he approached the descending vessel. Resisting the urge to linger before exiting his vessel, Yoda opened the cockpit and tiredly motioned the dark-skinned master to go ahead:

"Master Yoda, matters have advanced considerably since your journey to Kashyyk, and Dathomir."

The distaste in Windu's tone was clear at the mention of Dathomir, but Yoda paid it little mind. Instead he retrieved his gimer stick from the cockpit and began to descend the ladder. Windu, sensing the aged Jedi's tiredness changed his tone from forthright to concerned as he continued:

"The Wookies have acted upon our instructions and are already on planet and master Koon, who was briefed as to this affair is part of the entourage. Master Koon is taking all suggested steps regarding security including shielding himself from other force users."

Yoda, eyes closed as he processed the information, opened them to cast a sharp look at Windu before asking:

"Original issue, resolved it is?"

Here Windu took a moment to glance back at the outwardly composed form of master Ban-Yaro behind him, it was Yaro, at Windu's hand gesture that answered Yoda in a steady but frustrated tone:

"The communications issue is still undergoing investigation, our investigations have revealed anomalies in multiple joint operations with Republic Security which will require going over..."

Here Yaro trailed off and Yoda easily picked up on his anxiety as Windu again made a gesture, this time Yaro's voice had replaced its frustration with confusion:

"Additionally, we have been forced to suspect the presence of a rogue agent within the temple itself, the purposeful deletion of orders from anyone above the level of Knight, could only be done by someone with authorised access. Access to _all_ levels of communications, besides personal encryption. Master Yoda, as you no doubt are aware, other than yourself and the Chancellors office, the only ones with such access are senior masters, and myself."

Yoda, unwilling to accept the idea, but without any recourse otherwise issued the instructions he had been hoping to never have to give:

"Master Ban-Yaro, investigate all masters in this matter you will. Master Windu, understand I do, that the chancellors office, normally out of our jurisdiction it is."

Windu, face and countenance tight at the implied instruction nodded his assent. Turning to Yaro, Windu nodded his head in dismissal, and as the master hurried off, voiced the query he had been wanting to voice since Yoda had told him he was going to Dathomir:

"Master Yoda, what do you intend to do?"

Yoda walked slowly past his friend, his gimer stick striking the metal underfoot harder than normal:

"Master Windu, to the senate chambers, I go."

 **Fundamental change**

Eyes closed, and silencing ward up. Harry disassociated himself from his immediate surroundings and slipped across into the Aether. Unlike before, the flow was restive, almost peaceful. The eternal choir lulled rather than screamed across his consciousness. Souls, ghosts, apparitions, all swirled before and around him. They begged him for life, but the eagerness from before was muted, dulled in the absence of the other.

Everything was, almost on hold. The currents lapped rather than dragged, nothing pressed upon him in this space. It was as if he was in the eye of a storm, treading a becalmed sea. Souls, ever-present watched him even as their platitudes continued to fall upon his ears. This was, unnerving. Strangeness permeated his surroundings, flickers of something skittered across his consciousness. It was not malignant, or benign, the closest description Harry had was simply that it was.

Light flared to his left and he allowed his attention to be diverted. Several souls, unusually cohesive had congregated to watch him, they did not drift as the others did but held there place in the admittedly lax current. Robed forms surveyed him, and as he looked back upon them. The current surged. Caught of guard, Harry nearly stumbled into the mists that surrounded him as the voices surrounding him picked up their urgency. The figures, held their ground in the face of the sudden drag and continued to observe him. Regaining his footing, Harry made his way towards them against the current, and attempted to hail them over the sudden pressure:

"Who are you?"

Nothing, the figures simply stood and stared at him, several wore masks of a design he had never seen before, others did not, their faces however seemed almost ablated. Stark white faces with the suggestion of a nose and perhaps contours where eyes used to be. As he neared them, the current intensified. In all his time of being able to interact with the Aether, Harry had never struggled to traverse it. But here, he was clinging on by sheer force of will. Bent against the strain, Harry just made out the dispersal of the group, save for two. One masked, one not continued to survey him. As one the two lifted their inward hands to him and the current stilled completely. Very nearly toppling at the sudden lack of pressure, Harry stood tall and created a defensive barrier between himself and the apparitions. As the barrier snapped into place, a near gut-wrenching sensation of wrongness spiked throughout him. Crying out and staggering at the sensation Harry nearly missed the whisper that replaced the normal voices in this place:

"Let us in."

Abruptly, he felt himself being thrown, his barrier immediately destroyed under the force of something impossibly strong. In seconds, he was ripped from his purchase in the Aether and flying without any sense of where he was headed. Light bloomed in his mind and darkness tugged at his senses as he was roughly slammed back into his body. The sensation of wrongness within himself, ever-present during his flight persisted. Stunned, Harry let himself lie for a few minutes before the need to reconnect with his body got to much for him.

Breathing gently, Harry let sensation return to his consciousness. He was lying on his side, uncomfortably wedged diagonally in the corner of the box. As the strangeness and feeling of some rapidly fading bruises accompanied by nausea penetrated, a strange sensation of vertigo gripped him before he was flung across the floor of the box and into the adjacent wall. Rubbing his forehead, which had just slammed against metal, Harry willed the box to dissolve. As the walls liquefied a pair of huge furry hands reached through the metal and grasped him by the front of his robes. A roar that nearly deafened him accompanied his being bodily dragged out of the collapsing mass and brought face to face with a very upset Sheowtulla.

 **Escalation**

As Jaina stood to attention and listened to the communication being relayed from Corellia she had to resist the urge to indulge in another fit of anger. Commander Chertin, in his apparent wisdom, had decided that they were taking too long. So, here she stood, Chara off to her left, smug smile plastered over his face, listening to her new orders:

"You are to engage the fugitive immediately, local enforcement have been notified and shall provide you with assistance. Lethal force is now permitted. However, you are to prioritise the recovery of Potter's body, that of any associates is of no consequence. Only you are to take possession of the corpse. Failure to secure the fugitives body is unacceptable. Am I understood, Lieutenant?"

The blue holo image of Chertins face filled the cockpit space, he was staring directly at her. His less than pleasant features seemed to loom over her. Steeling herself, and fighting the incredulity at this sudden turn around in the operation, she forced herself to respond:

"Orders received, and understood, Commander."

The floating head nodded at her before it winked out of existence. Chara, seemingly oblivious of the mood she was in chose this moment to speak up:

"Lieutenant, I will inform the pilot of our change in course immediately, I request permission to contact CorSec patrols immediately before our quarry has a chance to run."

Irritation at the man's refusal to acknowledge the other members of the team who weren't of a higher rank penetrated into her rushing thoughts. So, with a far more clipped tone than she normally used she set the wheels in motion, all the while unable to shake the question of why they hadn't made the jump to hyperspace yet:

"I will notify the rest of the team, you will prioritise requesting assistance from an interdiction capable vessel along with whoever else is in range. Requisition of these forces is to be logged as an anti-piracy engagement"

As the man snapped his usual customary salute, she turned on her heel and opened the bulkhead to allow Istive re-entry. The obvious curiosity on Istive's face was greeted by a stony look from Jaina as she gave her instructions in a flat tone:

"We are engaging the target, direct course, shields up, power to the weapons on my mark."

Jaina passed her wide-eyed friend and marched quickly down the central corridor. As her shoes clicked on the metal grating below she accessed the internal comms:

"Jy, get to the central turret, Carvin get your gear ready for the retrieval of a body in zero G. Lasclong, I want you to secure the cockpit and other vital areas then head for the forward gun, I'll not run the risk that he can teleport onto us. Orders have changed people, we have been given the go ahead for lethal measures."

The affirmatives resonated through her comm unit and she paused as she felt the ship tremble with power under her as Istive fed the engines. Closing her eyes she rested her head on a cold support strut and enjoyed the coolness against her forehead. She'd seen firsthand what Potter could do on the ground, would he be as dangerous in space? She didn't want to find out but had no choice.

Sighing deeply, Lieutenant Jaina Comarilla made her way to the hologram pad beneath the cockpit. She unhooked the data slate from her belt where it had been stowed since its recovery back on Corellia. As she entered the now hardwired on salon pod she engaged the diplomatic protocols on the hologram pad, ensuring there was no trace or ability to tap in from the cockpit above her. This was one conversation she did not want to get back to Commander Chertin. The pads emitters sprang to life as she connected, a smaller image on the wall in-front of her sprang into existence and she took in the robed form. The data-slate felt heavy in her hands as she quickly went about disobeying an express order for the first time in her admittedly short career. She had to hurry, she would soon be out of time before they had to engage.

 **Gambit**

Senator Sheeve Palpatine kept the satisfied smile from his face with long practised discipline as Amedda leant across from his place in the chancellors podium to whisper in Valorum's ear. His discipline was sorely tried however as Valorum's face went nearly white in shock and Palpatine caught a glimpse of the frowning visage of the Jedi attending the Kashyykian delegation. Valorum, seeming to shake his shock off, straightened and readdressed the senate, his tone betraying his disbelief however:

"Senators, I am sorry to force this change in proceedings but I have just received news of an attack upon the Trade Federation embassy by as of yet unknown elements. In light of the ongoing crisis between the Federation and Naboo I rule that the current discussion be suspended until investigations have been put in hand."

The hush that proceeded this statement, gave Palpatine all the time he needed to affect a startled, nervous disposition as the implications of this event dawned on the few senators present. Rising to his feet, Palpatine disengaged the pod from its mooring and allowed it to drift into the hearing space. Mas Amedda, seeing him rise announced him to the forum:

"The senate recognises the Senator of Naboo."

Carefully adopting a posture of deference, Palpatine issued his statement before any could object to his breach of protocol:

"Senators, I am deeply shocked at what the Chancellor has just relayed to us. I assure you, Naboo is not involved in this cruel act upon the Trade Federation's embassy. I can state with all certainty that all personnel and material will be made available to the senate and our support staff will be dispatched to assist the Federation should they grant us the great gift of accepting. Despite recent events "

The uproar at his statement was expected, the missives being sent out along the diplomatic encrypted channels would be flying, with decrypted copies invariably finding their way into his information traps. Sending a reassuring look to the busy trade federation pod, several levels down to his left, Palpatine calmly re-docked his pod at the request of the chancellor and forced himself to walk in measured steps back to the hangar. Ignoring the blind, groping searching of Plo Koon's force presence.

For the entirety of the journey back to his suites, Palpatine did not allow himself to break character, even as his shuttle passed the plume of grey smoke and dust emanating from one of the embassy buildings close to his own. Upon entering the suites however, his measured tread abruptly changed into a flurry of movement as he stripped the office of every countermeasure and every concealed data storage device that was not to be expected in such an office. Within minutes the offices was clean, and anything incriminating was currently flying to his secondary office, courtesy of a fully primed assassin droid. Calmly seated behind his desk, Palpatine sent the official recording as a data packet direct to Naboo. With luck, the Queen would be watching it with the Viceroy, assuming the Jedi had been delayed enough.


End file.
